The Orphaned Shinobi
by SulliMike23
Summary: The Chuunin exams are here and three new shinobi from the village of Tentougakure have joined the exams. What changes do they have for Naruto and the others? NarutoEvangelion crossover, NaruHina, ShinjiAsuka, maybe some SasuSaku. Under new management
1. Chapter 1

A/N: After seeing several episodes of Evangelion and Naruto, I figured why not put the characters of one of the series into the other as a slight crossover? I know what you're thinking, I'd have to make some serious alterations in characters right? Untrue, I can keep some of the characters as they are now, but make them slightly OOC but still work out the kinks that would make this crossover work. Now please enjoy.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto nor do I own Neon Genesis Evangelion.

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The Orphaned Shinobi

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_Chapter 1_

Thirteen years ago, in Tentougakure the Village Hidden in the Heavens (A/N: I used someone else's idea with their permission. I'll post where I got the idea later.), a great tragedy occurred that only matched that of the attack of the Kyuubi no Kitsune on Konoha. The tragedy was known as the "Mountain Massacre" and many innocent lives were lost that day. A boy, no older than 3, was one of the many survivors of the tragedy and witnessed his mother's own death while she protected his life. With his mother's death his father abandoned him, leaving the poor boy to live on his own. Years later, the boy grew and joined his village's ninja academy and graduated with several other students; two of which became his teammates in a three-ninja Genin team.

The boy's name was Shinji Ikari, a boy with a past as hard as anyone's in the ninja world. He had short, brown hair and a pair of blue eyes that seem to make him plain; when in reality, he's a village heartthrob. While he was popular among girls, his two teammates didn't exactly fit the fangirl-type. To other girls, Shinji was as handsome as they come and he would go into a relationship with one if it weren't for his low self-esteem. Since he was orphaned, Shinji had lost all confidence in himself even when his skills as a ninja prove him to be a strong Shinobi.

His two teammates, as stated, were girls and yet they did not fawn over him like most did. The first of the two was a pale girl by the name of Rei Ayanami. She was unusual in both appearance and personality; she had short, blue hair and a set of red eyes that add to the oddity of her pale skin. Her personality would make her the perfect Kunoichi since she hardly ever displays any emotions; when she does, it's usually in front of her teammates and no one else. Like Shinji, however, she was also an orphan of the "Mountain Massacre" but with no memory of who her parents were.

The third of their Genin team was Asuka Sohryu, a blue-eyed, fiery-haired girl with a temper to match. While in public, Asuka seems like a typical girl that boys would die for; but in front of her teammates, it's an entirely different story. The girl would lose her temper to the simplest of things and would mostly direct it towards Shinji and Rei. She also acts as though she were the true leader of the team. She would even give negative comments to them even after she would start pushing them to assist her on their missions. But even with this vain personality, she still has a softer side and would often talk to Shinji about her problems. Ironically, she too was an orphan; but unlike her teammates, she was orphaned after her mother hung herself a year after the "mountain massacre".

While it may seem like a coincidence that these three orphans were on the same team, they still supported one another like any ninja team should. You would also think that if these Genin were under the tutelage of a sane, strong ninja like many teams; you couldn't be more wrong.

Their sensei, Misato Katsuragi, isn't exactly a good teacher even with her Jounin status. She drinks, she's somewhat of a slob, and her cooking isn't exactly a chef's dream. However, she does care for the wellbeing of her students and is like a surrogate mother to all three of them. She would often say that if she had the chance, she would adopt all three of them as her own children. However, she was their sensei and was still a ninja with great skills. She would often come to her students' rescue if they faced a Shinobi none of them were prepared for and come out on top. She often commented that she hated the thought of losing either of her three students in battle.

While this team had been Genin for nearly a year, all of that was about to change. The village leader, Sandaime Tsubasakage, had gotten word of movement near Fire Country, home of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, which Genin teams from other hidden villages were heading there. He knew that it meant one thing; the Chuunin Selection Exams were taking place there. It also concerned him since he also heard of ninja from the Village Hidden in Sound were also moving and there was rumors of a possible attack. The Tsubasakage knew that it meant trouble.

"The Chuunin Exams?" One of the Heaven Ninja in the Tsubasakage's office asked.

Sandaime Tsubasakage, or Kozo Fuyutski as he was known outside of his duties, turned to face all the Shinobi gathered in his office. "That is correct; with all of the movement within the borders, there is no doubt that they are going to start."

"But where will this year's exams take place and when do they start?" Asked a Chuunin.

"They will take place in a week from today," he said lowering his head before bringing it back up. "In Konohagakure."

Murmurs and whispers began to spread throughout the assembled Shinobi as they had all heard of various stories of great Shinobi from the Village Hidden in the Leaves. The Tsubasakage silenced the assembly by waving his hand before continuing. "However, only one team will represent our village in the upcoming exams."

This caused all the gathered ninja to go in an uproar; most of them were Jounin with Genin teams. The Tsubasakage then silenced them again by clearing his throat. "Because of this, I have already chosen the team that will represent us in the exams."

"Which team is it, Tsubasakage-sama?" Maya Ibuki, another Chuunin, asked from her seat.

Kozo smiled amusingly at the question before answering. "It will be none-other than Team Katsuragi."

Misato, the violet-haired Jounin instructor of her said team, looked at Kozo in shock before hesitantly pointing to herself. "M-m-m-my team?" She stuttered with a slight squeak in her voice.

Kozo grinned and nodded in affirmation. "That's right, Misato, your team."

"But, but, Tsubasakage-sama," Misato began with almost a pleading look. "My team has only been in the field for nearly a year; they're not ready for something as big as the Chuunin exams yet."

Some of the other Jounin instructors seemed to agree with her as they too have heard of Team Katsuragi's exploits since they began taking missions. While many of them were D-ranked missions that were very common to all Genin teams, her team had also completed three C-ranked missions as well as two B-ranked missions. While that was an impressive record, for many villages that wasn't enough for a squad to be even qualified for the Chuunin exams. The Tsubasakage, however, felt differently.

"I have seen your squad's record, Misato," Kozo began as he turned towards the window facing the village that his Shinobi resided in. "And I am very impressed with the successes your team has performed. I feel that they are, indeed, ready for the Chuunin exams."

Misato was at a crossover, she didn't want her squad in the exams so she had to come up with another argument. "But people die in these exams; my team isn't ready to handle that kind of pressure!"

Sandaime Tsubasakage didn't seem to be phased and continued his argument. "Have you forgotten what a Shinobi's life is all about, Misato?"

That stopped Misato dead in her tracks as she looked at the Tsubasakage apprehensively. "We shinobi always put our lives on the line when we go out into the field. Regardless of whatever the consequences, a shinobi must fight for his or her home even if it means their own death." Kozo explained. "Every other village knows that, and rumors say that Konohagakure will also be letting rookies into the exams. However, they are just rumors."

That shocked everyone, even Misato to the core. If Konohagakure was allowing rookies into the exams, that means they must have some very skilled ninja in their ranks. "Furthermore, I feel that of all the rookie teams that we have at the moment, yours is, by far, the most skilled of the entire rookie Genins. They have proven themselves a great asset to our village and should be recognized, as such, in the Chuunin Exams." He then turned to fix his gaze on Misato, who felt very small at the moment. "Any further objections, Misato?"

Misato was at a loss for words; to have her team praised by the Tsubasakage meant that they have, indeed, impressed him. But she couldn't shake the feeling that he wasn't telling her the entire truth of the matter. Seeing that it was useless to continue arguing with the Tsubasakage, Misato lowered her head and reluctantly said no.

"Excellent, then you are all dismissed." With that, every shinobi in the room began to exit. But before Misato could reach the door, the Tsubasakage stopped her. "Except you, Misato."

As the rest of the Tentou-nin exited the room, Misato stayed behind and stood in front of the Tsubasakage's desk as the door closed. The two were now alone and the Misato knew this meant he needed to talk to her privately about this matter. The Tsubasakage looked at her seriously before speaking.

"I know how you feel about this decision." He said as if he read her mind. "And I can understand why; but this is something that must be done and your team is the only team I can count on."

"But sir, if my team goes, they won't last very long, even _if_ they make it to the final part of the exams." Misato pleaded as she stood in front of Kozo's desk trying to convince him to change his mind.

"Are you saying that you doubt your team's abilities?" Sandaime asked as he turned to her with a stern look.

Caught off-guard, Misato replied instantly. "N-no, I never said…" But Kozo interrupted her before she could finish.

"Then I am certain that your team can handle themselves." He stated before sitting in his seat and turned to face the window, which faced the village. Seeing no point in leaving, Misato stayed; she knew there was an ulterior motive behind the Tsubasakage's decision.

"There's more to this than what you're saying, isn't there?" She asked, point-blank.

Kozo didn't even turn to look at her when he replied, "Yes, as a matter of fact."

"What is it?" Misato asked, now more concerned for the motive than her team.

Fuyutski sighed heavily before turning to fully face Misato in his chair. "I have been receiving reports from our ANBU black ops along our borders with Sunagakure and they are quite disturbing." This caught Misato's attention as she listened inventively. "There are reports of unusual movements of their troops along the border of Konohagakure. It is quite possible that something big is about to occur and it involves those two villages and the Chuunin Exams."

Misato took all this in and thought about it carefully. "You're suggesting that the Chuunin Exams may be a ruse to start a war on Konohagakure."

Kozo clasped his hands together as he leaned in his chair. "Exactly," He then looked at Misato very seriously. "This is not only a good chance for your team to earn the rank of Chuunin, but it is also an A-ranked reconnaissance mission. I want you to gather as much information as possible before the final part of the Chuunin Exam. If this whole exam is, indeed, a ruse to start a war I want our village to be ready if it ever comes to us. Also, if the war is being involved with another Shinobi Nation, I want to know that as well. If it comes to war, I want you to assist Konohagakure as much as possible before leaving."

Misato stood perfectly emotionless; deep down, though, she was shocked to the core at the thought of another war. Even before the "mountain massacre", Tentougakure had suffered great losses during the Great Shinobi War and many of their best ninja were killed in that war. The thought of another war frightened her and she hoped that it wouldn't happen. "So, you want me to investigate the exams and assist Konoha, if possible is that it?"

"Precisely, Misato." The Tsubasakage confirmed.

Misato swallowed hard before asking, "When do we leave?"

"Tomorrow morning."

Later, Misato had told her team to meet her in their usual training area in an area near their village's walls. Asuka, in her red kunoichi outfit, Shinji in his brown jacket and pants, and Rei in her blue gui with a white sash tied around her waist all waited patiently for Misato. Asuka paced very impatiently from left to right, while Shinji and Rei sparred with one another practicing their taijutsu.

"Ugh!!! Where the hell is Misato-sensei!?" Asuka nearly yelled, causing Shinji and Rei to stop their training. "She should've been here two minutes ago!"

"Calm down, Asuka." Shinji said softly. "I'm sure she has a good reason for being late."

"I agree with Shinji-kun," Rei said almost in a monotone voice. "There is no reason for you to be upset, Asuka-san."

"Upset!? UPSET!?!" Asuka yelled as she stomped towards her two teammates. "I am WAY beyond upset, Wonder Girl!" Asuka yelled at Rei, using her nickname for her. "I am absolutely FURIOUS!!!"

"Someone mention me?" Came Misato's chipper voice from behind Asuka, who immediately spun around and pointed at her.

"YOU'RE LATE MISATO-SENSEI!!!"

Misato laughed as the tension settled. A few minutes later, after calming Asuka down, Misato had gathered her students to a bridge within the village. She had stayed quiet as they walked, which kinda bothered Shinji.

"I'm sure you're all wondering why I called you all out here." Misato said looking at her three kids.

"Yeah, what's up? Is it a new mission?" Asuka asked, almost eager to show off her skills as a kunoichi.

"Not exactly, Asuka." Misato replied.

"Then what Misato-sensei?" It was Rei who asked that.

"I'm just here to say that…" She said making a dramatic pause. "Congratulations on being representatives of our village for the upcoming Chuunin exams."

"Oh is that all? Well if that's…" Asuka began but her eyes widened as she registered her sensei's words. "SAY WHAT!?!"

"The Chuunin exams?"

"Us?"

"That's right!" Misato answered in a sing-song voice. "You three have been selected, by Tsubasakage-sama himself, to head to Konohagakure to participate in the exams."

"Awesome!" Asuka exclaimed, pumping her fist in the air. "Now I can show those Leaf-nin what I'm capable of!"

"When exactly do the exams take place, Misato-sensei?" Shinji asked ignoring Asuka's jubilation.

"A week from today, Shinji." Misato answered with a nod.

Asuka then shoved Shinji out of her way as she brought herself up to Misato with stars in her eyes. "When do we leave!?" She asked very quickly like a kid who had just found their presents under the Christmas tree.

"We leave tomorrow morning." Misato said simply, still keeping her smile.

"Tomorrow morning!?" Asuka whined like a child being punished.

Misato's face grew stern. "That's right, so I expect all of you to get a good night's sleep. We leave first thing in the morning and we'll be training along the way." Her face then turned solemn as she looked at them all as if she would never see any of them again. "When these exams come up, it is my hope that all of you pass and walk away as Chuunin of our village. I also hope all of you will be prepared for these exams. I can tell you right now; these exams will not be easy. I should know; I've taken them before. I must also warn you that other villages will be sending their genin to the exams and some of them may be stronger than any of you." She then wore a proud smile as she finished her speech. "But I have faith in all three of you and I know you will all come out on top. We leave at 0700 tomorrow so get some rest. Dismissed!" With that, the team dispersed and they all went home.

The next morning, Misato awaited her three students at the village gates. The Tsubasakage stood with her as her students approached. First Shinji, then Rei, and after a few minutes Asuka. Tsubasakage examined each one of them and noted their appearances.

Shinji adorned his usual attire, which was a fish net-patterned violet shirt covered with a brown blazer and a brown khaki pants. His shuriken pouch was wrapped around his right leg and he adorned his village forehead protector, which had the shape of a half cut maple leaf and he wore the standard blue shinobi sandals.

Rei wore a light blue doge-like t-shirt with a pair of light brown shorts with her shuriken pouch in the same area as Shinji's. Her forehead protector was wrapped around her neck and hung loosely above her chest. Around her waist was a white sash, which was wrapped in a bow behind her and she had bandages wrapped around her forearms.

Asuka wore a red one-piece Chinese-like outfit that had the left sleeve cut short while the right side had a fish net sleeve. Like Shinji and Rei, her shuriken pouch was wrapped around her right leg while on her left leg she had another fish net that extended from her thigh to the top of her knee. She also had a dark red cloth wrapped around her left arm while she wore her forehead protector like a headband while two hair pieces made a pair of bands in her fiery red hair.

Each of them wore their back packs and were ready for the long journey to Konohagakure and Kozo was there to see them all off. Misato, adorning her red Jounin jacket and violet clothes, waited for them and when all of them were ready, the turned towards the exit of Tentougakure and began their long walk to the Chuunin Exams.

Watching them, Kozo muttered quietly to himself. "Good luck to all of you."

**TBC…

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A/N: Well, this was the first attempt at an Evangelion/Naruto crossover and I want to know what you guys think so I expect some feedback. As for where I got the idea for Shinji, Asuka, and Rei's outfits I will post the link to my profile. So please click on the little button at the bottom of your screen that says "go" and click on it and post a review please.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Well, I'm glad some people like this fanfic of mine. But now I face a problem that I hope some of you can help me with. My Japanese is rusty and coming up with Jutsus for all of the Shinobi from Tentougakure is gonna be hard for me because of that. As a result, I can't think of any good Jutsus for these shinobi to use as of yet. So I need help from all of you to help me come up with original Jutsus for Shinji, Asuka, Rei, and Misato for right now before I start to include the other characters of Evangelion into this mess.

Disclaimer: I do not own Neon Genesis Evangelion nor do I own Naruto. Naruto and all characters relating to it belong to Masashi Kishimoto. Neon Genesis Evangelion and all characters relating to it belong to Yoshiyuki Sadamoto and Gainax. All rights reserved.

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_Chapter 2_

The walls and gates of Konoha were massive. They rivaled that of the gates of Tentougakure and were well guarded. Team Katsuragi, minus Misato and Rei, all stared in awe at the sight of the village as they stopped short of the entrance. Misato was grinning, mainly because she had seen the place before when she was a Chuunin. Rei was amazed, but she just didn't show it.

"So this is Konohagakure…" Shinji mused as he stared up at the walls.

"Yep, this is the place." Misato replied with a happy tone.

This was also a relief for the team. Along the way they had been training every now and then with their chakra control as well as their taijutsu, genjutsu, and ninjutsu techniques. They had come across a few bandits that kinda helped brush up their fighting capabilities and ate enough to last them for a while. The trip had taken up almost the whole six days they had left Tentougakure but the whole trip was worth it. It was the day before the exams, and they had arrived on a bright and sunny day.

"All right!" Asuka exclaimed, startling Shinji and Misato. "Now it's time these Leaf-nin knew who they're dealing with!" She then grabbed Shinji by the collar of his blazer and began to literally drag him through the gates. "C'mon Shinji!" She said ignoring Shinji's protests to make her let him go.

Misato sighed heavily. '_What am I gonna do with her?'_ She thought to herself as she and Rei followed the two of them.

As the team wandered about the village, many of the locals began to stare at them. Some were wondering what they were doing there in the first place. Others wondered where they came from, considering they had never seen their village symbol. Misato stopped the team for a moment while turning to get their attention.

"I'm going to go find us a hotel to stay at. You three wander around for a while. I'll meet up with you later." She said before disappearing in a puff of smoke.

"Well, you heard her you two, let's go scout around and see what places of interest we can find." Asuka said as she made her way through the streets with Shinji and Rei in toe behind her.

As they walked, they passed a few shinobi about their age just staring at Asuka with blushes on their faces. Asuka, looking smug, flipped her hair to add to the effect and it worked. _'That's right boys; you can look but don't touch.'_ She thought to herself proudly.

'_Why does she keep doing that?'_ Shinji mused while rubbing the back of his neck in embarrassment.

"AAAAHH!!!" They heard a scream that echoed through the town and caused them to stop in their tracks and look around for the source.

"That sounded like a scream." Rei pointed out as she looked towards the sky.

"Let's go check it out!" Asuka declared as they sprinted off towards the direction of the scream.

Later they arrived to see a bad sight. In between two lines of fences stood four ninja and two academy student. There was another but he was being held up by one of the ninja by his long blue scarf. The boy in question had spiky brown hair and wore a tan t-shirt with the Konoha leaf symbol on it and a pair of gray shorts. The two academy students wore casual clothes two but on their heads they all wore a pair of green goggles.

The four ninja, on the other hand, were different. Two of them were Suna-nin; the other two were Konoha-nin. The girl Suna-nin had blonde hair spiked in three ponytails; she also wore almost the same outfit as Rei but carried a large fan on her back. The other was a boy and had face paint on his face. His black outfit covered his entire body including his head, save for his face. He also carried something on his back but it was wrapped in bandages.

The two Konoha-nin were also a sight to see. The girl had pink hair and was dressed almost the same way as Asuka, save the two arm pieces. The boy, on the other hand, was unique himself. His blonde hair was spiked all over the place and Shinji could make out six whisker marks on his face as well. The one thing that made him stand out was his outfit. It was a bright orange jumpsuit with small patches of blue on the shoulders as well as a few traces of white.

'_What kind of a ninja wears orange?'_ The three Tentou-nin thought to themselves.

They hid themselves in a tree and watched the whole scene unfold before them. They immediately assumed the scream came from the boy in the Sand ninja's hand and that his scream was because of his predicament. They just continued to watch as the orange-clad boy shouted loud enough that the three of them could hear him a mile away.

"Put him down you bastard!" The blonde kid shouted pointing at the Suna-nin.

The sand ninja merely smirked and said, "But I wanna have some fun before some noisy folks arrive."

The kid in his grip tried kicking himself free, but a person his age couldn't possibly get someone like the person holding his scarf to let go with just small kicks. He merely choked out for the Sand-nin to let him go, but it didn't seem that the Sand-nin was going to let him go so easily. Shinji, Asuka, and Rei all watched as the whole thing happening and they were having mixed feelings. While they wanted to see how the Leaf genin handle the situation, they couldn't stand watching a kid like that getting bullied by a ninja and want to step in themselves. At the same time they didn't want to cause trouble before the exams even started.

Just then they saw the orange-clad Leaf genin run towards the Sand genin holding the boy. They then noticed something; the Sand Genin lifted his free hand and twiddled his fingers a little. Rei, being the one with the most chakra awareness than Asuka or Shinji, spotted a thin, blue line of chakra coming from the boy's fingers.

'_Chakra strings, this one is a chakra puppet user. That explains the bundle on his back.'_ Rei thought to herself as she observed the orange-clad boy tripped over one of the chakra strings.

The black-clad Sand genin was then about to bring a fist to the young boy's face…when a rock hit his wrist causing him to let go of the boy. Everyone, including the three Heaven genin, turned to see another genin in a tree right across from the one they were hidden in. He had raven-black colored hair that was spiked in the back and wore a dark blue t-shirt, white shorts, and white and blue cloths surrounded his forearms like the one on Asuka's arm.

The pink-haired girl almost immediately went into a fangirl type squeal with one thing escaping her ecstatic lips, "Sasuke-kun!"

When Asuka saw him, she almost went the same way. _'Wow, even the Leaf village has a cute boy. Too bad he's not as cute as Kaji-sensei.'_ She thought to herself with a slight blush.

The man Asuka was referring to was Ryoji Kaji; he too was a Jounin from the Village Hidden in the Heavens like Misato. Kaji was Tentougakure's local playboy and would flirt with even kunoichi from other villages. Asuka was under his tutelage for a while before joining Tentougakure's ninja academy and developed a slight crush on him to the point where she would use a genjutsu to try and get him to notice her.

At the sight of the newcomer, Rei was a little stunned, though she didn't show it. She hadn't detected his chakra signature until he threw the rock. _'This guy, he must have good stealth capabilities if I wasn't able to detect his chakra like that.'_

At the moment, this 'Sasuke' was bouncing a rock in his left hand looking down at the two Sand genin. "What do you think you guys are doing in our village?"

He then caught the rock one last time and crushed it with his bare hand. The act alone stunned Shinji. _'This guy must be very strong to have crushed that rock like that.'_

Sasuke's look at the Sand genin turned into a glare after he let the dust from the rock he crushed slip through his hand. "Get lost." He then narrowed his eyes. "But then, you're not the only foreign team in our village, are you?"

This confused all in the alley, including the three Heaven genin. "What are you talking about Sasuke-teme?!" The orange-clad ninja shouted.

"I mean," His gaze turned towards the three Heaven ninjas. "The three ninja in that tree over there."

Almost immediately, Team Katsuragi's eyes all widened at his declaration. The ones down on the ground all turned their gazes towards them and saw them as well. Seeing no point in hiding anymore, the three mentioned Genin decided to show themselves and jump down from the tree landing almost in between the Leaf ninjas and the Sand ninjas.

"How'd ya know we were here?" Asuka asked with a suspicious tone.

The orange clad boy, named Naruto Uzumaki, gawked at the sight of Asuka. _'Wow, this girl's as cute as Sakura-chan!'_

The said pink-haired kunoichi was staring at the team in general. _'These guys are from Tentougakure! First a team from Sunagakure, now a team from Tentougakure; what's going on here?'_

"I'll answer that, once you tell me why five foreign ninja are in our village." Sasuke Uchiha answered with a leer.

The black-clad Sand genin, Kankurou, scoffed. "Tch, I take it you Heaven ninjas are here for the Exams too?"

It was Rei who answered his question. "That is correct."

"Exams? What exams?" Naruto asked, scratching his head.

"Enough talk," Kankurou said as he took off the bundle on his back and set it down on the ground where the bandages.

"Hey, you're not going to use Karasu are you?" The blond Sand genin, Temari, exclaimed in protest.

But before he could use the chakra puppet, another voice interrupted the tension. "Kankurou, enough."

Almost immediately, the two Sand genin felt a rush of fear wash over them. Rei and Sasuke, on the other hand felt a little stunned as the two looked to see another Sand Genin hanging upside down from his feet on a limb from the same tree Sasuke occupied. He had short, spiky, red hair and wore a dark brown outfit. He wore a white sash around his body and on his back was a huge gourd. His eyes were green and didn't have pupils; but the most unique thing about his eyes was the black marks that surrounded them, much like a raccoon's eyes. The other distinct thing about him was a red kanji symbol on his forehead right above his left eye; Shinji recognized the symbol as the one for love.

The boy had his arms crossed and he had a killing intent in his eyes that stared directly into Kankurou, who stuttered one word. "G-Gaara!"

The boy, Gaara, continued in a sinister-like tone. "You're disgracing our village."

'_When did this guy appear next to me?'_ Sasuke thought as he struggled to maintain a cool composure despite how shocked he was.

Rei was also trying to maintain her composure when she stared up at the newcomer. _'How come I didn't detect his chakra signature until now?'_

Shinji was looking at the newcomer almost with the same look of fear that had washed over the two Sand genin. _'I don't know who this guy is, but for some reason…I'm scared of him!'_

"L-listen, Gaara…these guys, they started it…" Kankurou stuttered nervously.

"Shut up…" Gaara said in a low, menacing tone. "Or I'll kill you."

That made Kankurou really shut up as he flinched in fear. Everyone there was shocked to see that. _'He just threatened his own teammate without remorse.'_ Shinji thought to himself before looking at Kankurou. _'And from the look on Kankurou's face, he meant it too!'_

After Kankurou made his fearful apology to Gaara, Gaara turned to look at Sasuke. "Please excuse my teammate." After that, Gaara dissolved into sand, shocking the three Heaven Ninjas before reappearing in front of his team.

"Let's go, we're not here to fool around." Gaara said to them.

"Right." Kankurou said with a slight gulp before the three Suna-nin turned to leave.

"We better take a hike too, you guys." Asuka said turning to Rei and Shinji. "No use stickin' around here."

The six ninjas didn't get far before Sakura stopped him. "Wait a minute!"

"What is it?" Temari asked, not turning to look at her.

"Judging from your forehead protectors you guys are from Sunagakure and Tentougakure. The Fire nation, Wind nation, and Mountain nation have an alliance, but the treaty does not permit ninjas from entering each other's villages without permission." She said to all six of them before taking a step forward. "Tell us why you're here."

"Oh relax, pinkie." Asuka said to her with a taunting grin and a wave of her hand.

"**PINKIE!!?!? WHO DOES SHE THINK SHE'S CALLIN' PINKIE!?!"** Inner Sakura shouted inside Sakura's mind.

"What you're asking for is quite obvious. Don't you know anything?" Temari said before pulling out a little card. "This is a traffic pass. As you guessed, we're Genin of Sunagakure from the Wind Country," She then motioned towards the three Heaven Ninjas. "And these three are Genin of Tentougakure from Mountain Country. We came here to take the Chuunin selection exams." She then turns to the three Tentou-nin. "And as they confirmed, they're obviously here to do the same thing."

"Yeah, so don't get your panties in a twist." Asuka said to finish the conversation.

"The Chuunin selection exam?" Naruto mused. "What's a Chuunin selection exam?"

"You really don't know?" Temari asked crossing her arms.

"And I thought Shinji was stupid." Asuka shrugged with a grin.

"Naruto-nii-chan, you advance from a Genin to a Chuunin if you pass this exam." The young scarf boy, Konohamaru, told Naruto.

"Really!? Then I should take it too!" He declared pumping his fists.

Asuka just scoffed as the three Sand ninjas turned to leave again but were stopped again, this time by Sasuke. "Hey you, what's your name?"

Temari turned to him with an almost giddy smile. "Who me?"

"No, the one next to you with the gourd." Sasuke corrected pointing to Gaara.

The said person turned to Sasuke and answered plainly. "Sabaku no Gaara. I'm also interested in you. What's your name?"

The boy grinned and answered. "Uchiha Sasuke."

'_Uchiha? As in the Uchiha Clan? That explains why he saw us in the tree. His Sharingan eyes must have developed.'_ Rei pondered as she observed the two Shinobi.

"Hey, what about me?" The blonde asked pointing to himself in eagerness.

Gaara looked at him indifferently. "I'm not interested." He said before he and his teammates turned around and leapt away.

"Oh well, let's go Shinji, Rei." Asuka said before she too turned around.

"Wait, what about you three?" Sasuke said stopping them. "I need to know your names as well."

"Alright then, since you put it that way…" Asuka said turning around. "The name's Sohryu Asuka, don't forget it." She declared with a wink.

"I am Ayanami Rei." Rei introduced herself plainly.

"And my name is Ikari Shinji." Shinji said timidly.

'_This guy's very shy. It's kinda cute. Of course, he's not as cute as Sasuke-kun.'_ Sakura thought to herself as she looked at Shinji.

"Well I'll introduce myself to you then!" Naruto declared before pointing at them. "The name's Uzumaki Naruto, the future Hokage of Konoha!"

That actually made Asuka laugh causing Naruto to glare at her. "Future Hokage? Oh please, the only thing I'm looking at is a dumb, blonde, loudmouth!"

"WHAT DID YOU CALL ME!?!?!" Naruto shouted at the top of his lungs.

This actually got a laugh from the three kids and Sakura, and a slight smirk on Sasuke's face. The only ones who didn't find it funny were Naruto, Shinji, and Rei. Rei, because she didn't want to show any amusement into her face. Shinji, because he was embarrassed at his teammates. Naruto didn't find it funny because it was directed towards him.

"Well now that we know two out of three of ya, you're pink-haired friend has to introduce herself now." Asuka said motioning towards Sakura, who looked a little stunned before answering.

"My name is Haruno Sakura."

"Good, now that that's out of the way, let's go you two." Asuka said turning to leap away with Rei close behind her.

Shinji, on the other hand, turned and bowed towards them. "I apologize for my teammate's rudeness, she meant no offense."

This stunned the present company; Shinji was actually apologizing to them for the rudeness of another. Usually it was the other way around, but this kid was apologizing for her. Sakura mentally noted that Shinji reminded her of Hyuuga Hinata, another rookie Genin from their generation.

"Let's GO Shinji!" Asuka called from a rooftop.

"Coming!" Shinji called back before bowing respectfully towards the Konoha ninjas and leaping away to follow his teammates.

"Those Heaven ninjas are rather interesting." Sasuke said watching the said people leave.

"Yeah," Naruto nodded. "Too bad that red-head's such a meanie."

"Naruto!" Sakura shouted grabbing him in a neck hold.

* * *

"WHAT!? WHAT DO YOU MEAN WE WERE MISINFORMED!?!?!" Came the angry shrill of Asuka's voice from the hotel they were staying at. 

"What I mean is," Misato said as she rubbed her ear of the ringing from Asuka's angry shout. "We miscalculated the start of the exams by a week. So what I'm trying to say is, the exams start next week instead of tomorrow."

"Aww man! And I was so looking forward to kicking some ass!" Asuka whined with her head down in a sulk.

"Oh relax, Asuka, we've got plenty of time to prepare before then." Misato said waving Asuka's worry out of the way. "Tell you what, why don't we take a little tour around the town before the exams start. That way we can find what training fields we need to prepare ourselves, find good places to eat (where they don't serve meat of course)," Misato mentioned looking at Rei, considering she was a vegetarian. "And more importantly, check out the competition. We're not the only team here, as I'm sure you already know."

"Yes, we encountered a team from Sunagakure before we met up with you, Sensei." Rei said.

At the 'Sunagakure' Misato's interest was perked looking back to what the Tsubasakage had informed her of. "Oh really?"

"Yes, one of them, a 'Sabaku no Gaara' has peaked my interest quite greatly." Rei nodded, answering Misato.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, the guy uses some kind of sand gourd for his techniques. We didn't even see him before it was too late." Asuka added with an almost quiet tone.

"I see…" Misato mused again. "Anything else?"

"Well, we did run into a team from here." Shinji said adding Team 7 to the mix of the encounter.

"Oh? What were they like?"

"One of them was rather…eccentric." Rei said not finding the right kind of words to describe Naruto.

"More like a stupid loudmouth." Asuka added with a grin.

"Asuka…" Shinji warned softly.

"Well we can continue this later. In the meantime, I want you three to get some rest. We've got a long week ahead of us." Misato said dissolving the conversation and leaving the three of them alone.

Later that night, Misato was staring out the window of their hotel room, while looking out towards the moon. _'From the way they described this "Gaara" kid, he sounds pretty dangerous. I'd better tell them to keep an eye on him during the exam.' _Misato's attention then turned to the only boy on their team. _'My _real_ worry right now, is Shinji…will he be able to have the confidence needed to help them get through the exam?'_

Misato then walked over to the said boy and stroked his head. _'I hope you can do this Shinji. If not for me and the girls, but for yourself.'_ With that, Misato went to her bed and went to sleep. Little did she realize, that the exam ahead would be a very eventful one.

* * *

A/N: OK, that was the end of Chapter 2. Sorry it took so long, writer's block can be a real hell. Anyway, I need help with ideas for jutsus for Shinji, Asuka, Rei, and Misato for later chapters. I'll also be asking for more ideas later on as the story progresses. For ideas, please PM me or e-mail me at one of the three following e-mail address: sullimike23 hotmail(dot)com 

I await all your ideas. Arigatou!


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: OK, so far I've gotten two PM's with suggestions on jutsus for Shinji, Rei, Asuka, and Misato. I've come up with two more jutsus myself but I won't reveal them yet. I still need more, so keep sending me suggestions.

Disclaimer: I do not own Neon Genesis Evangelion nor do I own Naruto. Naruto and all characters relating to it belong to Masashi Kishimoto and Shounen Jump. Neon Genesis Evangelion and all characters relating to it belong to Yoshiyuki Sadamoto and Gainax. All rights reserved.

* * *

_Chapter 3_

Two days have passed since their fateful encounter with the two genin teams from Suna and Konoha and Team Katsuragi had been training in the forest area of the Leaf village to prepare their selves for the upcoming Chuunin Exam that would take place in five days. Misato had reported their arrival via airmail to the Tsubasakage as well as their encounter with the team from Suna, especially about Gaara. The morning after their arrival, Misato had asked for details about the two teams they encountered. When she was told about the team from Suna, she was quite concerned about their arrival.

From what her team told her, the team from Suna seemed to be an elite Genin team meant for frontline and dangerous missions. The girl with the fan was obviously a master at wind jutsus and she used that giant fan to use those jutsus. She knew that a good majority of Tentou and Suna ninjas were masters of wind jutsus so it would almost be a stalemate with that girl. The boy with the chakra puppet, Kankurou, also had a little bit of concern to Misato; she knew that there had been a master of chakra puppets in Sunagakure by the name of Sasori and that he made chakra puppets like the one that Rei had named.

Her main concern out of the Sand team was this 'Sabaku no Gaara'. From what her team described of him, he seemed like a vicious killer for a boy his age. From the way they described the fear emanating from the other two Suna ninjas, the boy was no newcomer to killing people and that he did it without remorse. They also mentioned his sand and sand gourd and that also caused some worry in Misato. When they were done explaining everything about the Suna team, Misato mentioned to them to try and avoid him as much as possible before they know what he's capable of.

Then they described the Leaf village team they had encountered and she was quite amused. They mentioned that one of them was Sasuke Uchiha; Misato knew who he was alright. She knew all too well of the reputation of the Uchiha clan and their tragic history. From the way Rei told her that he had seen the three of them in the tree they hid in, she then knew right away that his kekkei genkai had developed sometime during his training. She also urged a bit of caution about him, but she didn't say that they were to avoid confrontation with him.

When they described the other two Leaf genin, Misato was actually quite amused. From what Asuka told her, this Sakura Haruno was a fangirl of her fellow teammate, Sasuke and that the third member of their team, a Naruto Uzumaki, was just an idiot. Asuka also mentioned that Naruto was an even bigger idiot than Shinji, earning a little scolding from Misato; but coming from Asuka that would be a compliment to Shinji. Misato wanted to know more about this team if they were going to enter in the Chuunin exam.

Right now she wanted to focus on what they were doing right now, which was looking around the village of Konoha. "Admit it, Misato-sensei, we're lost!"

Misato groaned hearing Asuka's complaint. "Ok, we're lost! Happy?"

"Ugh! It figures!" Asuka yelled throwing her hands into her hair. Before either of them could go any further a low grumble came from Shinji. "What're you grumbling about Baka?"

"It's not me Asuka, it's my stomach." Shinji said when a grumble came from his stomach again.

"How can you think of food at a time like-" Asuka scolded before she too felt her stomach growl. With a nervous laugh she blushed. "Ok, I guess I'm kinda hungry myself."

"Perhaps we should find a place to eat." Rei suggested with a slight blush from her stomach grumbling.

"Good idea; and we better make sure they can serve stuff other than meat." Misato said as she walked around.

Shinji walked behind the girls when he started to smell something. "Do any of you smell something good?"

The girls all stop to look at Shinji before sniffing the air themselves. "Hey, you're right Shinji, something _does_ smell good!" Misato said.

"I guess you're good for something." Asuka said earning a moan from Shinji.

"It smells like ramen." Rei said after identifying the smell.

Misato sniffed again and said. "You're right Rei, it is ramen!"

"Over there," Shinji said pointing towards a building. On it read a sign saying, "Ichiraku's Ramen".

"Perfect, we can eat there." Asuka said looking towards the ramen stand. "The best part is, we can each get what we want, and Wonder Girl won't have to eat meat."

"Well, any ramen is OK by me!" Misato said cheerfully before walking to the ramen stand herself with her subordinates close behind her. When they went under the banners, they were greeted with the smell of ramen noodles, various scents of meats and vegetables, and the sound of boiling water and sizzling frying pans.

They each took a booth when a girl about Misato's age came up to them. "What can I get you folks?"

"One bowl of pork ramen for me please." Asuka said rubbing her tummy.

"A bowl of spinach ramen if you please." Rei asked for with her monotone voice.

"One chicken ramen for me, thank you." Shinji said softly with a small smile.

"And I'll take a shrimp ramen!" Misato said cheerfully.

"Coming right up!" The girl, Ayame, said cheerfully before giving their orders to her father. After a few minutes of cooking, the girl came back with their bowls of steaming hot ramen and served them all their bowls.

"That certainly smells good," Misato said, her mouth watering. "Ok guys, let's eat."

"Itadakimasu!" Came from all of them; Shinji's being more of a small mumble and Rei's being monotonous.

With that, they each took a pair of chopsticks, and began eating. The moment she slurped her first set of noodles, Misato went completely starry-eyed and began to eat more with a bit of speed. Misato, growing up, had to live off of cheap restaurants, instant foods, and Shinji's cooking and had grown to love instant ramen. True she also lived a little off of other ramen stands like this one, but in all her life she had never tasted ramen that was so delicious like this.

"This has got to be the best tasting ramen I've ever had!" Misato exclaimed gleefully.

This caused Ayame to giggle slightly. "I take it you've got a taste for ramen?"

"Are you kidding?" Asuka said sardonically. "She used to eat instant ramen cups every day before she became our instructor. That's when Shinji here," Asuka motioned towards the boy, who was slowly eating his bowl. "Started cooking for her."

Ayame smiled feeling a little connection. "Sounds like our number one customer here in Konoha." She said amusingly before checking the clock. "Speaking of which, he should be coming in here right about…now!"

"Oi! Jii-chan!" A loud, excited voice called out from behind the banners. It was a voice Team Katsuragi knew all too well.

'_Don't tell me that…'_ Asuka thought to herself before all four of them turned to see none other than Naruto Uzumaki standing there with a wide grin on his face but it fell the moment he saw the three of them.

"YOU!!!" Naruto shouted pointing at the three of them. "What are you three doing here!?"

Asuka just waved a hand at him dismissively. "We're eating here, what does it look like kid?"

"DON'T CALL ME A KID!!" Naruto shouted, a vein bulging behind his head while he waved his fist at her.

'_Is this the loudmouth that Asuka mentioned?'_ Misato thought to herself as she watched the situation amusingly.

"Naruto-kun, please don't yell at the customers." Ayame said to Naruto, causing him to calm down, but not by much. With a look of annoyance on his face, Naruto reluctantly sat down at a booth throwing a small glare in Asuka's direction.

"Your usual, Naruto?" Teuchi, the owner asked amusingly from his cooking.

Naruto's face became as bright as a light bulb the moment he asked that question. "You bet!"

"Alrighty, twelve bowls of Miso ramen, coming right up!" Teuchi said continuing his cooking.

The moment he said that, however, Asuka nearly choked on her noodles as she balked at Naruto. "Twelve!? You can actually eat that many!?"

Naruto looked at her then crossed his arms looking upward. "Actually, I can eat about 32 bowls; this is just a small amount for me."

'_THIRTY-TWO!?!?! And twelve is just a SMALL amount!??!'_ Asuka yelled in her mind.

Rei also looked at Naruto with a puzzled look on her face after swallowing a group of noodles herself. Shinji just stared at him with a group of noodles still hanging from his mouth. Misato, on the other hand, was actually giving him a wide grin.

'_He can eat that many bowls of ramen? I'm beginning to like this kid!'_ She thought to herself amusingly.

Teuchi handed Naruto his first bowl; who then took a pair of chopsticks and began to (almost literally) inhale the ramen noodles. Asuka just looked at him with a blank expression on her face, almost losing her appetite. Rei, Shinji, and Misato decided to keep eating though; trying to ignore Naruto's eating habits. Naruto paused in his eating, however and looked at Misato.

"You're their Jounin instructor right?" He asked, causing the person he asked to look up from her meal to look at him. "You're a Jounin aren't ya?"

Misato swallowed the noodles she had and smiled at Naruto. "Yep, the name's Misato Katsuragi. Nice to meet you, Naruto."

Naruto nodded with a fox-like grin. "Nice to meet you too." He then looked at her team. "Is it true that you guys are here for the Chuunin exam?"

Rei finished her bowl and looked at Naruto. "That is correct, Uzumaki-san. We are here for that very purpose."

Naruto actually blushed when she called him that and he rubbed the back of his neck with a slight laugh. "Please, call me Naruto. Uzumaki-san makes me sound old."

"What about you, Naruto?" Misato asked, catching the boy's attention. "Are you going to enter the exam with your team?"

Naruto's grin became even wider. "You bet! And we're gonna ace it too!"

This caused Misato to grin too. _'I like this kid's amount of confidence! He kinda reminds me of myself.'_

Shinji just looked at Misato and Naruto and thought to himself, _'Naruto and Misato-sensei are so alike, it's scary.'_

This gave Misato a good idea. "Say Naruto, can we ask you a favor?"

A puzzled look crossed Naruto's face. "What?"

"You don't mind giving us a tour of the village would you?" Misato asked with a bright smile.

This caused Asuka to spit out the last of her ramen noodles. "What!? You can't be serious, Sensei!"

"Well why not? He's a local, and you guys already met him. Besides, he knows more about this village than we do." Misato said, looking to Asuka; her smile never fading.

Asuka groaned as she finished her bowl. "Fine, I'll let him give us a tour."

"I don't see the harm in it." Shinji said softly with his bowl half done.

"I do not mind either." Rei said plainly as she asked for seconds.

Misato clapped her hands and looked at Naruto with a giddy smile. "It's settled then; what do ya say, Naruto?"

Naruto crossed his arms and looked up in thought. He then looked at Misato. "On one condition…"

"Name it."

Naruto gave her one of his foxy grins. "You have to buy my lunch!" This caused Shinji, Rei, and Asuka to blanch at that statement.

"You got it!" Misato said cheerfully, much to the protests of Asuka.

Ayame giggled to herself hearing the conversation. _'She's gonna regret that.'_

* * *

Misato walked behind Naruto, who had his left hand patting his belly while the other was behind his head. She was looking at the inside of her wallet with a glum look on her face. When she agreed to buy Naruto's lunch, she never anticipated it to cost her nearly half a month's pay; and that was just Naruto's lunch; her team's lunch nearly cost her the rest of her month's pay! The kid asked for twelve more bowls after she agreed to pay for his lunch, causing more protests from Asuka. Misato was now wishing she had listened to Asuka, considering the kid nearly cleaned her out. 

'_Note to self: never buy this kid lunch again!'_ Misato thought to herself with a sigh.

Her team walked behind her with mixed expressions. Asuka had a look that clearly said, "I warned her and she didn't listen to me"; Shinji had a regretful look on his face as he looked at Misato; Rei's expression was blank, but inside she was also feeling sorry for her instructor after seeing how much it cost her to pay for their lunch. The three had to wonder how many people Naruto conned into buying his lunch at Ichiraku's and nearly cost them their month's pay too. But at the moment, the said Genin was just giving them a rundown of the village; but after she looked up from her wallet, Misato began to notice something…odd.

Everywhere they went, she could see cold expressions and hateful glares being directed in their direction, but not towards her and her team in particular. From what she saw, the glares were being directed towards their tour guide, Naruto. This puzzled her greatly; from the short time she had started to know the kid, she could tell he was a little like her in many ways to the point where the two of them could actually be related. Yet, despite how annoying Naruto may be, he didn't seem like the dangerous type; but the people of the village were avoiding him like the plague.

'_What could this kid have done to cause these people to hate him this much?'_ Misato thought as she narrowed her eyes, looking at the people of Konoha and not paying much attention to Naruto's minor facts of his home village.

"And that…" Naruto said, pointing at the mountain looking over the village, where four human faces were carved into it. "Is the Hokage Mountain Monument. It's one of my favorite spots in the village."

Team Katsuragi looked up at the mountain in awe; along the mountain cliff were the faces of the Leaf Village's past Hokages that had guarded all of the village's people with their lives. Misato knew that the third Hokage was the current Hokage after the fourth gave his life to defeat the Kyuubi no Kitsune almost thirteen years ago, after the 'mountain massacre'. She was rather impressed at the artisans who were able to depict the image of the young faces of these men. Their thoughts were interrupted as they heard Naruto snicker a little.

"What's so funny, Naruto?" Shinji asked, looking at Naruto.

Naruto stopped his laughing a little and looked at Shinji. "Oh, I'm just thinkin' back to a few months ago, when I put graffiti on the entire mountain!" He then burst into laughter again and this actually causes a little laughter from Shinji, Misato, and even Asuka.

"You actually did _that?_" Asuka asked trying to catch her breath.

Naruto, still laughing slightly answered, "You bet! It was the best prank I ever pulled before I graduated from the academy! HAHA!!!"

Rei, being one who doesn't show amusement, thought about this as well as thinking back to the glares that she too noticed being directed at their host. _'Judging from what he's told us, the worst he has ever done was his pranks. Pranks and practical jokes are harmless when done correctly; and yet the people of this village seem to hate him for more than just childish antics.'_

"Anyway, moving on…" Naruto continued as they continued on their tour of the village.

Naruto showed them all the sights of the village, while ignoring the constant glares of hatred being directed towards him (that Team Katsuragi kept note of). Naruto finished their tour by showing them the training fields he usually trains at before he took them back to town and stopped when Misato told him that they were at their hotel. Misato kept note of the training fields so her team can train for the final part of the exam.

"Thanks for the tour Naruto." Misato said cheerfully, trying to hide her note of the glares and annoyance of him conning her of her money.

"Hey no problem!" Naruto said enthusiastically before looking at Shinji and the others. "I'll see you guys at the exam!"

"I look forward to it, Naruto." Shinji said with a smile before the said person gave him a grin and scampered off.

After he left their sight, Team Katsuragi couldn't help but think back to all the looks people were giving him. After they got to their hotel room, Shinji was the one who decided to talk about it.

"Did anyone besides me notice all the looks the people of this village were giving Naruto?"

"I noticed it too." Asuka said, her face being serious for once. "It's like they all hold a grudge against him."

"But what could he have done to cause an entire village to hate him?" Rei asked, adding her observation. "From what we know, the worse thing he has ever done to this village was vandalize a monument. And yet, their hatred goes deeper than that."

"Well whatever it is, we can ask him about it after the exam is over." Misato said to her team, crossing her arms. _'Though I'd _really_ like to find out myself!'_ She added mentally. "We at least know where we can train before the exam starts in five days. So why don't we have some dinner before going to bed."

That night, Shinji couldn't sleep and couldn't help but think back to their day with Konoha's local troublemaker and loudmouth. He just couldn't understand it, how can someone like Naruto be hated by an entire village? From what he noticed, the people at Ichiraku's seemed to like him and his teammates didn't seem to regard him as a threat but rather an annoyance. Naruto seemed like the kind of guy his friends, Kensuke and Touji, would like to get along with and yet the people here seemed to hold a big amount of hate towards him; why?

'_You truly are an enigma, Naruto Uzumaki,'_ Shinji thought to himself. _'One that I want to find more about.'_

* * *

A/N: Well, I managed to finish this chapter pretty quickly. But I still need more reviews and more help on jutsus; especially for the next chapter! As you know, the first part of the Chuunin exam requires the Genin there to use their skills as Shinobi to gather information without getting caught. So I need help for that in Asuka's case considering she'll need it to do the same thing as everyone else. So can someone help me out on that one? Anyway, please review, I like reviews. 


	4. Important Author's Note, Please Read!

Ok, I've gotten a few messages from people giving me great ideas for jutsus for Shinji, Asuka, and Rei and I got a couple thought of for Misato; but right now, I REALLY need everyone's help. And I do mean _everyone_. Before I write the next chapter I need help in giving something to these three so they can pass the first part of the Chuunin Exam. As you know, the first portion of the Chuunin Exam is a test of their information gathering skills; we all know how Naruto went about it and I've been thinking of putting Shinji in the same situation. But as for Asuka and Rei, I need help for them in using their Shinobi skills to get the answers. So any ideas on how they can cheat on the exam and not get caught will be very much appreciated.

We all know that the second exam is in the so-called "Forest of Death" and I've been getting plenty of good ideas for that. But right now, I need something for the first part before I get to the Forest of Death. So if anyone has good ideas, please send them to me via e-mail or PM. Send e-mails to one of the following two: sullimike23(at)Hotmail(dot)com or sullimike23(at)yahoo(dot)com (make sure you replace the "at" and "dot" with what's required. The person who's idea I will use will be credited for the idea as with the jutsus everyone is offering me. If I feel that not everyone is giving me ideas, I will not write the next chapter until I do get a good idea myself.

SO START CRACKIN' PEOPLE!!!!!


	5. Chapter 4

A/N: OK, I'm glad people are helping me out in this, but I still need more help. So, keep sending me ideas. So far, **Helcion Phoenix, Sun S. Li, **and **paintball-gamer** have all sent me great ideas for jutsus for these three. But I still need more ideas from other people besides them.

Disclaimer: I do not own Neon Genesis Evangelion nor do I own Naruto. Naruto and all characters relating to it belong to Masashi Kishimoto and Shounen Jump. Neon Genesis Evangelion and all characters relating to it belong to Yoshiyuki Sadamoto and Gainax. All rights reserved.

* * *

_Chapter 4_

After five days of readying themselves for the exam, the day of came by (too quickly for Shinji's taste). Shinji, Asuka, and Rei had gotten to the classroom 301, where the first part of the Chuunin Exam would take place and had entered the room to see it FULL of other Genins from other villages. They had gotten a few death stares from some of the applicants, but Asuka brushed them off as if they were nothing. They immediately refrained from mingling with the other applicants in hopes that they won't offend someone and start a fight before the exam starts.

Out of all three of them, however, Shinji was shaking like a leaf; not visibly mind you. He was more nervous than either of his teammates, even if one of them wouldn't show their anxiety. A few more teams came in, two of which looked like teams of rookies. Rei noted that two of the applicants had the pale eyes of the Hyuuga Clan and one of them had a white, little dog on his head; which meant he was from the Inuzuka clan. Shinji noticed the young Hyuuga genin with the rookies and immediately knew who she was; the girl wore a tan-grey sweater jacket with a hood, dark blue hair, and black pants. The girl seemed just as nervous as he was which led him to wonder why the heiress to the Hyuuga Clan, Hinata Hyuuga, would be nervous about.

The doors to the room opened again, and this time Team Katsuragi recognized them immediately. It was Naruto Uzumaki, Sakura Haruno, and Sasuke Uchiha; the team they had first met from the Leaf Village and one of them happened to be their tour guide. The moment they stepped in, more death glares would be directed at them and the other rookies. For a moment, Sakura and Naruto seemed a little scared; but their tension faded as one of the blonde rookies, a girl with long blonde hair in a ponytail, tackled Sasuke yelling out his name.

After a few moments of the nine rookies from the Leaf Village arguing amongst themselves, Shinji noted that the Hyuuga girl seemed to be a little nervous when talking to Naruto. It didn't escape Asuka's sight either. _'Is it me, or does that girl have a _crush_ on our blonde friend?'_

A few minutes later, another Leaf Genin, with a purple ninja outfit, a pair of glasses, and grayish hair walked to the rookies and began talking to them telling them to keep it down. After a few more moments of talking with him, the guy pulled out a deck of cards that he called 'info cards' and explained how he uses his chakra to show the information he's gathered. For a moment he talked about how his cards worked and showed them a map of how many applicants were attending the Exam. Then Sasuke Uchiha asked if the guy had info on all the applicants; which the guy, Kabuto his name was, said he did.

"I have the names of two of them," Sasuke said to him. "Sabaku no Gaara, and Rock Lee."

Kabuto gave the information on the two of them and what he said about Gaara next shocked Team Katsuragi. "…And get this, he walked away from all his missions, without a scratch on him."

'_Without a scratch on a B-ranked mission?! That's impossible!'_ Asuka thought to herself after hearing this news. _'We barely walked away from our two B-ranked missions alive! How can this guy walk away from his without a scratch!?'_

"So, anything else you need to know?" Kabuto asked the rookies, adjusting his glasses. That's when Naruto spoke up.

"Yeah, do you have info on three other applicants?" He asked, causing the rookies to look at him.

"Which ones?"

"The three from Tentougakure," This caught the said team's attention. "Shinji Ikari, Asuka Sohryu, and Rei Ayanami."

"Ok." Kabuto shuffled his deck and pulled out three cards from the deck. "Ok, we'll start with Asuka." After he focused his chakra, Asuka's information appeared on the card. "Asuka Sohryu, age-15, she's pretty well balanced in Taijutsu and Ninjutsu, but her Genjutsu could use a little improvement." He then focused his chakra on the second card and Rei's information pulled up. "Rei Ayanami, age-14, she seems pretty well balanced in all three but her genjutsu and ninjutsu abilities are a little above average." He then focused his chakra on the last card and Shinji's information appeared. "Shinji Ikari, also 15, he could use a little work in his genjutsu, his ninjutsu is a little OK, but he seems to have a good amount of taijutsu." He then looked at the number of missions they completed. "Woah, and get this, they've completed 35 D-ranked missions, 10 C-ranked missions," He paused and then looked at the rookies. "And two B-ranked missions!"

"Two B-ranked missions!?" Sakura exclaimed shocked at this information.

"Are you sure that information is correct?" Sasuke asked, also a little stunned.

"Of course it is; I've been gathering information about everyone here for as long as I've been a Genin myself." Kabuto said, adjusting his glasses again. "I get my information from helpful sources, so this information is accurate."

Rei couldn't help but ponder this. _'If he has information about everyone here, then maybe he has information about Naruto-san.'_

Ever since their tour through the Leaf Village, Team Katsuragi had been asking people around about Naruto; but all they got were nothing but cold stares, bad-mouthed comments, and several 'I don't know what you're talking about' comments. To say that it was growing annoying would be an understatement; the people of Konohagakure hated Naruto for some reason, and they wanted to know what. They had made it their personal goal to find out sometime during or after the Chuunin Exam why the people of this village hated someone like Naruto.

A few minutes later, after explaining the reasons that the Chuunin Exam was made to keep in good relations with other villages, Kabuto had said something about Otogakure, the Village Hidden in Sound, which caused Team Katsuragi to look at the Genins from the mentioned village. They noted the forehead protector had a musical note on it to symbolize their village and what the three looked like. They could tell that the three of them were young, cocky, and obviously not afraid to kill someone. Their thoughts were interrupted as they heard Naruto yell out and they turned to look at him again as he pointed to everyone in the room.

"LISTEN UP! I'M NARUTO UZUMAKI AND I WON'T LOSE TO ANY OF YOU BASTARDS! YOU GOT THAT!?" He yelled, loud enough to cause someone's eardrums to ring if they were close enough to him. Almost immediately, his pink-haired teammate began choking him in a headlock and yelled at him.

Asuka sighed with frustration at his declaration. "I don't know whether this kid is brave or stupid, I can't tell which."

Shinji found it rather amusing. "You've got to admit, he's got good spirits."

Rei didn't seemed phased by Naruto's little outburst, but she then noticed something out of the corner of her eye. The three Sound Genins began charging towards the Leaf Ninjas at incredible speed. A few seconds later, they attacked Kabuto, but the boy moved out of the way of one of their punches. Even Asuka and Shinji had to applaud his ability to dodge their attack; but their grins faltered when they saw the lenses of his glasses began to crack!

'_Impossible, how did they hit him!?'_ Shinji thought as he saw Kabuto's lenses broke apart.

"You saw them, didn't you Wonder Girl? They didn't hit him, did they?" Asuka asked frantically, looking at her pale-skinned teammate. But before Rei could answer, they saw Kabuto keel over and vomit all over the floor! "Eww...I think _I'm_ gonna be sick!"

"How did they do that?" Shinji asked, to no one in particular.

"I do not understand either. I saw that the Sound Genin clearly missed Kabuto-san; I do not see how his glasses would have cracked or how he could vomit like that." Rei said calmly, but inside she was just as stunned as her two teammates.

"Do you think it could be some kind of secret jutsu?" Shinji asked Rei, looking at her.

"Possibly," Rei answered, still looking at the bandaged Sound Genin, "As Kabuto-san said, there is little information about the Sound Village because of how recent it was built. I can only assume that what they did to Kabuto-san was a jutsu that no one has ever seen before."

"Well that's just dandy." Asuka said sardonically.

Just then a huge puff of smoke appeared at the front end of the room and a voice from within the smoke shouted, "Alright you maggots settle down!"

As the smoke cleared, a dark tan skin man with a pair of scars running down his face, wearing a grey uniform, black cloak, and black bandana with the Leaf Village hitai-ate on it appeared at the front of the room along with a few other men and women dressed in the same uniform as him. To say that the man wasn't intimidating would be a lie; the man looked as though he was meant to scare people. Shinji almost felt like he was looking at his father years ago.

"I'm your first proctor for the Chuunin Exam, Ibiki Morino." The man introduced himself almost coldly. He then pointed at the Sound ninjas. "And you, Sound Ninjas; are you trying to get yourselves out of the exams?"

"Sorry, it's our first time, we got a little jumpy." The bandaged Genin, Dosu, said calmly.

The man in front of the room spoke again. "As of this moment there will be no fighting in this exam without strict authorization from the proctor." He then held up a small block that had a number on it. "Now, each of you will come up to the front of the room and hand over your paperwork. You'll each then be given a number and you are to seat at your designated number while we hand out your paper."

Just as one of the other men there showed a bunch of papers, Naruto shouted out loud…again. "A WRITTEN TEST?!?!?!?!"

Later, everyone had gotten their numbers and had gotten to their seats. Shinji felt a little worse for wear; considering he was now separate from his teammates, who were also separate from each other. But he felt the same kind of surprise as Naruto when the man had told them that they were having a written test. Shinji may have been a village heartthrob, but that was mainly for his good looks and for the fact that he was fifth in his class, compared to all the other guys. He was good at his jutsus and homework, but when it came to written tests he was always a nervous wreck and it always ended up with him failing those tests. Asuka and Rei would have no problem, considering that the two of them were at the top of his class. Written tests would be a breeze for them both; while he would probably end up failing this one as well.

Next to him, or rather next to the person next to him, he saw Naruto getting nervous as well. Next to him, however, he saw that young Hyuuga girl from before telling him good luck. This actually eased his anxiety a little bit with a little amusement; he could definitely tell that the girl had a crush on Naruto. It was a relief seeing _someone_ in this village who didn't hate the guy.

"Alright you maggots, eyes front!" Ibiki announced as everyone looked at him while he began writing on the chalkboard. "Before we begin I'd like to go over a few rules of this exam. I won't answer any questions, so listen carefully."

'_Rules, why does he _not _want us to ask any questions about that?'_ Asuka thought to herself angrily.

"First rule:" Ibiki started as he continued to write on the board. "You will each start out with 10 points. The test will be made up of 10 questions, one point for each question. The test will be using a subtraction system; in other words, if you get one question wrong you will lose one point. If you answer all 10 correctly, you'll keep your 10 points."

'_Sounds simple, but if I get all 10 wrong, I'll get a zero!'_ Shinji thought worriedly as he stared up at the board.

"Second Rule:" Ibiki announced again as he stared at all present. "Whether you pass or fail will be determined by the combined points of your teammates."

This shocked EVERYONE in the room. The fact that their combined points would pass or fail them all? What was this guy getting at? Sakura Haruno was the one to voice everyone's mind.

"Wait a sec! Why is the score combined as a team!?"

"Shut up!" Ibiki yelled at her before continuing. "I have my reasons, so listen up. Now, the most important rule. The third rule is, during the exam anyone the sentinels around you catch someone cheating will have two points subtracted for every offense."

'_What?'_ Rei asked in her mind as she stared in puzzlement at the man talking to them all.

"So during the exam, there will be some who will lose all 10 of their points and be asked to leave." He finished as he grinned at them all.

'_So there are ways to lose points even without getting the answers correct. If these guys catch someone more than five times, that person will fail!'_ Asuka thought angrily at what the man was saying.

"Now understand that the person who gets caught cheating will be destroying themselves." Ibiki continued his explanation.

"So I'd be careful if I were you guys." One of the sentinels said, scaring two of the Genins a little.

"As Shinobi trying to reach the level of Chuunin, show us that you can act as proud Shinobi should." Ibiki said again with a grin.

'_So then, if Shinji-kun fails his test, me and Asuka-san can still cover for him right?'_ Rei thought to herself as she continued to listen to Ibiki's speech.

"And the final rule:" Ibiki said as he drew the issue to a close. "Those who lose all of their 10 points will not only fail, but their teammates will _also_ fail."

'_WHAT!?!?!?!'_ Asuka yelled in her mind at the man's declaration.

Of the Genins in this exam, Shinji and Naruto immediately paled at what the man said. If either of them doesn't get the questions on the test right, then not only do they fail themselves, but they also fail the rest of their team! Shinji gulped down a breath of air he had been holding after making this realization.

"The final question will be given to you at the 45 minute mark." Ibiki announced as the clock was about to strike 3:30. "You have one hour to complete the exam." Just then the second hand of the clock struck zero. "Begin!"

Almost immediately everyone in the room turned over their test papers and began working. Shinji, Asuka, and Rei all stared at theirs and read all the questions thoroughly. But as they and many of the other applicants found out, it was not going to be an easy task. They ignored all of the sounds of pencils striking and stroking the papers as they kept thinking to themselves the questions in general.

'_What kind of questions are these?'_ Asuka thought to herself as she finished reading her paper. _'These questions are _way_ too complicated for _anyone_ to answer. Well, maybe not me, considering I was second in our class; but still, why would they give us such hard questions? I don't think Shinji can answer _any_ of these!'_ After finishing that thought, she looked up to the front and stared at the person she was thinking of. _'C'mon Shinji, get at least _one_ of these damn questions right!'_

Shinji was now panicking as he stared at his paper with sweat threatening to run down his face. _'How can they expect someone like me to answer hard questions like these?! What am I going to do? Asuka will _kill_ me if I fail this exam!'_

Rei, on the other hand, was thinking about the whole purpose of the test itself. _'I do not understand. Why would they give us such hard questions and not expect anyone to cheat?'_ She then looked at the sentinels in the room as they stared at all the applicants. _'And why would they only deduct two points if someone cheats? Normally, if someone were to cheat they would fail indefinitely. It is almost as if they are _expecting_ someone to cheat.'_ She then saw one of the Sentinels mark down something on his paper. _'It would seem that someone has been caught.'_

Asuka just continued to stare at her paper in frustration. _'What's the point in this whole test!? Why aren't they just gonna fail someone for cheating period?!'_ Asuka then realized something. _'Unless…'_

Rei also came to the same conclusion. _'That must be it.'_

At the same time in their heads they thought, _'They're/they are expecting us to cheat!'_

Rei then looked around the room. _'It all makes sense. The hard questions, the sentinels, the strict rules…they told us that we should act as true shinobi would. A true shinobi would use their ninja skills to actually cheat on this test without getting caught. This is not a test of our knowledge, but a test of our information gathering skills.'_

Asuka then stared at her paper again. _'But then, who are we supposed to get our answers from?'_

Rei then looked over the number of applicants and then realized something. _'The number of people in this room is not divisible by three; someone in this room is already a Chuunin and they know the answers. We are supposed to get our answers from them.'_

Rei then lowered her hands underneath the desk, out of the sight of the sentinels and made a few hand seals. _'Suidon: Mizu hansha no jutsu _(1)._' _After she declared that jutsu in her mind, a water puddle appeared underneath her desk and then she made a few more hand seals and then declared another jutsu in her mind. _'Hyoton: Shoushitsu Koori Kikan no jutsu_ (2)_.'_ After she had made it, a thin, rectangular sheet of ice appeared above her near the ceiling. Now, to her, she could see the reflection of the ice mirror in the puddle below her; but thanks to the genjutsu she had made before making her two jutsus, neither the proctor, or any of the sentinels could see the two.

Years ago when a doomed Clan had been destroyed in Kirigakure, some of their scrolls had ended up in Tentougakure that had explained on how to use ice-type jutsus. Because Tentougakure did get snow every so-often, it was essential for water-using ninjas be taught these techniques; Rei was one of them. She had also perfected a new use for one of these jutsus to make it appear invisible to the enemy, but visible to her and all of her allies. She also learned how to manipulate the mirrors with her chakra so that she could direct them at her opponents.

She was doing just that as she used the ice mirror's reflection to reflect back to the puddle she had made earlier. She looked over several papers and then spotted one that had most of the answers down. She immediately came to the conclusion that this person had the right answers and began to copy the answers off of their paper, and wrote them down on hers. All around her, other applicants were getting the idea too and doing the same thing using their skills. Asuka then began to fill out her paper, but instead of using any of her shinobi skills, she used her own brain to figure the answers out.

Shinji, on the other hand, was stressed out to the point where he was just about ready to scream. He just couldn't figure out any of the problems! He was close to looking over one of the applicants' shoulder to copy off of them, but then he'd get caught! He didn't want to do that to Asuka and Rei; he never did like to burden the two of them with his problems. Shinji was as selfless as they came; he rarely worried about his own well-being and focused mainly on everyone else.

About 15 minutes into the test, one of the sentinels threw a kunai past Naruto (barely missing his face) and it embedded itself into the test paper and desk in front of the applicant behind him. It scared both the applicant and Naruto as they stared at the sentinel.

The applicant stood up. "What'd you do that for!?"

The sentinel just grinned. "You messed up 5 times, you failed." The applicant was stunned that he had been caught. The sentinel then pointed to him. "The other two of your team also fail. Now get out of here." The other two Genin from the guy's team stood up and the three of them walked out of the room. Almost immediately another person was called and their team failed; then another, and then another. The number of people in the room began dropping like flies.

'_These guys have good eyes; they'll catch me cheating!'_ Shinji thought in a panic as the people in the room began to walk out or be forced out, despite their protests. After a few other teams failed, the total number became 13. Then three more failed and the number became 16.

One of the sand genin, the one Asuka and Rei recognized as Kankurou, raised his hand and asked if he could use the restroom. One of the sentinels put handcuffs on him and went with him so that he wouldn't try anything; but Rei noted that this one wasn't a real sentinel. Shinji then looked at the clock to see the time; it was 4:10, 40 minutes had passed since the exam began.

'_I have no choice,' _Shinji thought. _'I'll have to risk everything on the tenth question! It's my only chance of passing this test!'_

Meanwhile, Misato had taken upon herself to meet up with the Jounin instructors for the three rookie teams of Konohagakure. She had been stunned to see that one of them was Kakashi Hatake, the Copy-cat ninja of Konoha. She had met Kakashi before, and Kakashi confirmed it to the other two instructors, Asuma Sarutobi, and Kurenai Yuuhi, but she didn't say where they had met. She didn't mind that Asuma smoked (she did too and she asked for one), or the fact that Kakashi read the Icha Icha books (she read a few of them herself); she was just bothered that it was completely quiet without the teams there.

"It sure is quiet without all of them here." Kakashi said to them.

"No kidding," Misato said relaxing into the couch next to Kakashi. "By now Asuka, one of my Genins would be scolding the rest of my team or just yelling at them for no reason."

"Oh don't worry; you might end up seeing them sooner than you think." Asuma said as he took a drag from the cigarette he was smoking.

"Why's that?" Kakashi asked his friend suspiciously, who tapped some of the ash from his cigarette into an ash tray.

"This year's first examiner," He began, "Is Ibiki Morino."

This caused Kakashi to go wide-eyed when Asuma told him that. _'Looks like this year's exam is going to be more difficult for them that I thought.'_ Kakashi thought to himself before leaning back into his couch. "They just _had_ to choose _that_ sadist?"

"Sadist?" Kurenai echoed as she and Misato exchanged looks.

"That's right," Asuma said causing the two of them to look at him. "You're still a rookie Jounin aren't you Kurenai? And you're new to our village, Misato, so I don't expect either of you to know who he is."

"So who is he?" Kurenai asked as she looked at Kakashi.

Misato looked at Kakashi too. "Yeah, I've never heard of him before from all the encounters our village has had with your ninja."

Kakashi looked at the two women and said. "He's a pro, a real pro."

"A pro?" Kurenai repeated before looking at Asuma. "A pro at what?"

Asuma took a drag of his cigarette again before blowing out the smoke before looking at Kurenai. "Torture and interrogation." This caused the two women to gasp in shock. "Although there's no physical torture in the exam, I don't doubt that the students are feeling the stress from his interrogation skills. He's Konoha ANBU's Torture and Interrogation squad leader, Ibiki Morino." He then took another drag of his cigarette and looked at Misato. "And the scariest part of him is that he can drive a person into a corner mentally, control his mind, and bully him." He then looked at Kurenai again. "He can find a person's weakness and bring it to the surface."

Misato bit back a gulp as Asuma told her this. _'Oh great! As if this test wasn't going to be hard enough for them already! Asuka and Rei, I know, will get past his interrogation tactics; but Shinji will crack like a nut! His mental stability ain't exactly like theirs!'_

Back at the examining room, the 45 minute marker had finally come. "Alright, I will now give out the tenth question!"

'_It's about time he gave it to us, I was getting impatient!'_ Asuka thought to herself as she readied herself, as did Shinji and Rei. All around them the other applicants were readying themselves to answer the tenth question.

"However," Ibiki began, "Before I give the tenth question, I need to explain one final rule." Just then the door to the room opened again and Kankurou and the 'sentinel' that was with him came back causing everyone to look at him. "Well, I hope you found your trip to the bathroom…enlightening."

Kankurou began to sweat as the man said that. _'Does he know about Karasu!?'_

"Oh well, take your seat." Ibiki told him, and the Sand genin did so but not before giving something to his teammate, Temari. Ibiki then took a step forward towards the window. "I'll now explain. This…is a hopeless rule."

'_What's this guy talking about!?'_ Asuka thought to herself while getting frustrated with the guy dodging the question. _'He's already given us hopeless rules already, how can this one be any different?'_

"First off, you all have the choice whether to take the tenth question or not." Ibiki announced as he turned towards all present.

This shocked everyone in the room. _'Why would he give us the option of choosing to take this question or not?'_ Rei thought with puzzlement.

"What's the catch?" The Sand Genin, Temari, asked from her seat. "What happens if we choose not to take the question?"

"If you choose not to take it, your points will be dropped to zero." Ibiki explained calmly. "In other words, you fail; and that means your teammates will fail as well."

That caused all the applicants to stir and protest amongst themselves. _'So that just means that I'll _have_ to take the tenth question!'_ Shinji thought to himself as a bead of sweat trickled down his cheek.

"There's one more rule." Ibiki continued causing the room to go quiet again.

'More_ rules?!'_ Asuka thought to herself with anger. _'Just give us the question already!'_

"If you choose to take the tenth question and get it wrong," Ibiki began, closing his eyes. "You will not only fail, but you will also be barred from taking the Chuunin exams ever again!"

"WHAT!?!?!" Asuka shouted in a mix of shock, anger, and frustration.

The Inuzuka boy, Kiba, stood up and pointed at the man. "That's a load of bull! There are plenty of folks here who've taken the Chuunin exams before!" His dog, Akamaru, barked in agreement.

The man's shoulders began to shake, and then they could hear a low chuckle escape his lips. "Then I guess you can consider yourselves unlucky." He said, almost sinisterly. "This year, I _am_ the rule. That's why I gave you the option of quitting." That caused the Inuzuka boy to quiet down and sit back into his seat. "Those who don't have the confidence enough to take the question can choose not to take it and take it the next year or the year after that." The man then chuckled again.

'_This is bad! I know Wonder Girl and I can have the confidence to answer the tenth question and get it right! But what about Shinji?'_ Asuka thought to herself while holding her breath. _'I mean, Shinji ain't exactly the bravest of the three of us or the smartest. I don't want to fail…but then again, I don't want Shinji to suffer because of my stubbornness!'_

'_This is a "no-win" scenario,'_ Rei thought as she tried to hold back her emotions. _'On one hand, Shinji-kun can stay and all three of us can at least try to take the question but if either of us gets it wrong we will be Genins for the rest of our lives. On the other hand, if we choose not to, we will fail and still come back again next year. The question is: which will Shinji-kun choose?'_

Shinji, on the other hand, was now to the point where he was about to cry from all the stress. _'What do I do? I don't want to fail, but at the same time I don't want Rei or Asuka to suffer because of me!'_ Shinji whimpered to himself quietly. _'If I choose to not take the tenth question, I can still come back next year right? But what if Asuka and Rei get the question wrong? I don't want them to fail too!'_

"Now, let's begin." Ibiki began coldly. "Those who won't be taking this question, raise your hand now. After we've confirmed your numbers you can leave."

For a while, no one spoke as many were making the same debate with themselves as Shinji was. Rei and Asuka were also making the same debate, but not for their sakes, but for Shinji's sake. On one hand, they want to take the tenth question and are confident enough that they can get it right, but if Shinji gets the tenth question wrong then he'll suffer for it; on the other hand, they didn't want to continue onto the next part of the exam without him so they were also debating with themselves if they wanted to raise their own hands and fail as a team, but they didn't want to fail either. After a few minutes, one Genin finally raised his hand.

"I quit, I won't take it!" He said with great regret in his voice.

"Number 50, you fail. Numbers 130 and 111 also fail with him." One of the sentinels said.

The other two members of the Genin's team stood up with their heads down as the genin who raised his hand apologized to him. All at once more hands began to rise and more teams failed. When they all left the room, only 26 teams, including the 9 Leaf rookies, Team Katsuragi, and the team from Sunagakure. Shinji had yet to raise his hand though; he was still debating with himself whether or not he wanted to.

'_C'mon Shinji, all you've gotta do is just raise your hand!'_ Asuka thought as she stared at him. _'So what if we fail? I don't want you to fail! I know I berate you and all, but that doesn't mean that I want you to fail!' _She then lowered her head and gritted her teeth while the bangs of her hair covered her eyes. _'I don't want you to suffer any more than you already have.'_ She then raised her head and her eyes showed her resolve. _'Well then, if you won't raise your hand, then I'll raise mine for you! You owe me big time for this!'_ She was about to raise hers but stopped as she saw Shinji's right hand move.

'_Asuka, Rei…I'm sorry you two.'_ Shinji thought with regret as he began to raise his hand. But he stopped as he heard a loud "THWAP!" next to him. He looked to see Naruto with his palm on the desk in front of him.

The boy had a look of determination written all over his face; he was not giving up. "SCREW YOU!!!! I'M NOT RUNNING AWAY!!!" He shouted very loudly. "I'll take that question! So what if I stay a Genin forever, I'll become Hokage no matter what anyway!" Naruto then stood up and looked at Ibiki with his determination. "I'm not scared!" With that final declaration, Naruto sat back down in his seat with his arms crossed. Hinata Hyuuga, who sat next to him, smiled at his declaration; she thought if he was going to quit, she would quit with him.

Asuka just stared blankly at Naruto, as did Rei but Asuka grew a frown as she stared at him. _'Does this kid _ever_ learn to shut up?'_ She thought before looking back at Shinji, expecting him to raise his hand. But she gasped as his hand…went down?! Rei and Asuka were shocked when they saw this; Shinji was actually staying!

'_Did Shinji just…'_ Asuka began

'…_Lower his hand?'_ Rei finished.

Ibiki just stared at Naruto calmly. "I'll ask you one more time…" he said, "This is a decision that will affect your life. If you want to quit, now is your chance."

Naruto just grinned at him. "I never go back on my word; that is my nindo, my ninja way!"

Shinji was thinking something along the same lines. _'Naruto's right! So what if I'm a genin for the rest of my life? At least that if I've taken the tenth question without running away it'll prove that I'm not a coward!'_ He then looked up with the same determination that Naruto had. _'I always told myself that I'd never run away again! I'll never back down on my word either; that is my nindo as well!'_

Asuka smiled at Shinji as he decided to stay. Rei was also, surprisingly, smiling at her teammate; the fact that he was staying was proof that Shinji was indeed growing up. Asuka and Rei's attention then turned towards the person who encouraged Shinji to stay, Naruto Uzumaki.

'_Naruto, when this whole exam is over, I owe you a bowl of ramen. But _only one_!'_ Asuka thought. _'I'm not letting you con _me_ out of my money like you did Misato-sensei.'_

'_Naruto-san…thank you.'_ Rei thought happily.

Seeing that no one else was going to raise their hand Ibiki thought it was time. "Nice determination." Ibiki said before looking at the sentinels, who nodded their approval. He then turned his head towards the Genins with his eyes closed. "Well then, for the first part of the exam…everyone in this room…" He opened his eyes with a grin. "Passes."

Looks of puzzlement crossed almost everyone's face when he announced that.

"Wh-wh-what?" Asuka stammered as she stared at Ibiki.

"Wait, what do you mean 'pass'? What about the tenth question?" Sakura asked as she stood up from her seat.

This caused Ibiki to laugh. "There was no tenth question to begin with!" He exclaimed amusingly. "Unless you can consider the two-choice question the tenth question."

That's when Temari spoke up again. "Wait, then what about the other nine questions? Were they all a waste of time, then?!?"

"No, they weren't." Ibiki answered looking up at the ceiling. "Those nine questions achieved their purpose."

"What are you talking about?" Asuka spoke up as she rose out of her seat. "Stop talking in riddles and get to the point!"

Ibiki looked at them again with a smile. "The whole purpose of the first nine was to test each individual's information gathering skills."

'_So that assumption was correct.'_ Rei thought to herself.

"Information gathering skills?" Temari echoed.

That's when Ibiki continued by giving them a long explanation on how the whole test was about. He then took off his bandana to show everyone his scars that even shocked Rei. Shinji just stared at his scars with wide eyes. _'All those scars…'_

'_This guy must've been through hell and back accomplishing all those missions he's done.'_ Asuka thought as she too stared at the scars.

Ibiki put his bandana back on his head and covered his scars and continued his explanation about the test. He then finished with a few words. "The first part of the Chuunin Exam ends now. I wish you all the best of luck."

This caused a good jubilation from Naruto, causing Shinji to chuckle a little bit. Even Asuka had to giggle at Naruto's cheerful demeanor. That didn't stop a small grin from Rei's face either. Just then the window was crashed in as a ball of cloth came through with someone inside. The person then threw a pair of kunai into the ceiling revealing a banner that said "Second Examiner Anko Mitarashi is here!"

"Alright you maggots, this is no time to be happy!" the person from the cloth exclaimed. She was a violet-haired woman in her late twenties-early thirties and wore the same netting outfit Shinji wore underneath a gray trench coat. "I'm your second proctor for the Chuunin Exam, Anko Mitarashi!" She then raised her fist in the air. "Alright everyone follow me!"

All she got were several blank stares from all the assembled Genin. Asuka and Sakura were only reminded of two other people when it came to her. In other words, the woman reminded them of Naruto and Misato.

Ibiki then poked his head from behind her banner and said, "You're early, as usual."

The woman then stared at all the assembled ninja in the room. "78?" She then looked at Ibiki. "You let 26 teams pass? Are you losing your touch Ibiki?"

"No, we just have a good crop of Genin this year." Ibiki told her plainly.

"Oh? Well by the time I'm done with them, more than half of them will be eliminated." Anko said turning to the genin teams with a sadistic grin.

"M-more than half?" Sakura stammered. Shinji didn't suppress a gulp when she announced that.

The woman in front of them snickered. "Oh this is gonna be fun." She then turned a little serious. "Alright, you maggots have had it easy so far but starting tomorrow it's gonna get a whole lot harder. I'll let your instructors tell you the place and time." She then added playfully. "Dismissed."

Later that evening, Ibiki had begun gathering all the test papers, but when he got to Naruto's and Shinji's, he had been surprised and laughed. "I just passed two examinees who didn't even answer a single question on their test papers." He then looked out towards the window. "He's a funny one, this Naruto Uzumaki." He then looked at Shinji's paper. "This Shinji Ikari is rather interesting too."

The next morning, all the Genin teams that had passed the first exam were waiting outside a fenced forest area with signs that marked it as a forbidden zone. After explaining what happened in the first exam to Misato, Team Katsuragi couldn't help but feel proud of Shinji and be thankful again to Naruto. Had Naruto not made his little 'declaration', Shinji would've more than likely quit the exam and Misato's mission would've failed and Team Katsuragi would be on their way to Tentougakure by now. But thanks to Naruto, they were still in the exam.

The said person then voiced everyone's mind. "Wh-what is this place?"

"This is where the second part of the exam will take place." Anko began to explain. "This is the 44th training ground. But we call it, 'the Forest of Death'."

"Forest…" Shinji began.

"…Of death?" Naruto finished as they both gulped.

**TBC...**

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A/N: Well, that was a pretty long chapter. But next chapter will be the first of probably a two-part chapter. But I still need ideas for jutsus. Now the people I mentioned above don't have to give me anymore ideas if they don't want to; but everyone else has to, I'm now making it mandatory! I must receive at least 5 ideas from people, other than the ones I've mentioned, or I will NOT update. So start crackin' people! 

Oh! Before I forget, I'll explain the two jutsus that Rei used.

1.) **Water Release: Reflecting Water technique**-Basically it makes a puddle out of moister in the air that reflects like a glass mirror.

2.) **Ice Release: Disappearing Ice Mirror technique**-Now before anyone says anything, I'm NOT copying Haku's ability. As I explained a few scrolls of Haku's clan made their way to Tentougakure and ice techniques are used by those Snow ninjas in the first Naruto movie. So giving ice techniques shouldn't be just for them or Haku. Anyway, the way this jutsu works is that it's both a ninjutsu, and a genjutsu. While it makes an ice mirror, Rei adds a little bit of chakra to make it look invisible to only her opponents while she uses it to reflect objects to her eyesight.

Kudos go to **Helcion Phoenix** and **Sun S. Li** for these sorts of ideas, but the jutsus themselves are my own creation.


	6. Chapter 5

A/N: Since this fic is actually getting some attention, I'll forgive everyone for now. But when I get to the third and final part of the Chuunin Exams, namely the preliminaries, I expect more suggestions on jutsus for the three Tentougakure ninjas.

Disclaimer: See previous chapters.

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_Chapter 5_

Shinji stood staring at the fenced up forest in front of him; true he's been in forests before, but not in a forest like this! The proctor, Anko Mitarashi, called the place, 'the Forest of Death' and he kept wondering why. He could tell that the forest was creepy looking, that was a given, but it had also been fenced up; that meant the place had to be dangerous enough to be called that.

"This place really just creeps me out." Sakura Haruno said, shaking in her sandals.

Asuka looks at the place like it was nothing. "I don't see what's so scary about it."

This caused Anko to grin. "You should, they call this place the 'Forest of Death' and soon, you'll find out why."

Naruto simply frown and then in a mocking move of his hips, he imitated the proctor. "'They call this place the forest of death and soon you'll find out why.'" This caused a little laughter from Asuka and it eased some of Shinji's tension. Naruto then grinned at her with determination. "Do your worst! You're not gonna scare me away!" He then pointed at her. "I can handle anything!"

Shinji sighed and shook his head. "Nothing can dampen your spirits, huh Naruto?"

Anko merely grinned again. "So, looks like we've got us a tough guy." She then took a kunai and threw it past Naruto, actually cutting his cheek! The kunai went past a Grass village Genin and cut their hair. Anko then moved so fast that Shinji or Naruto didn't see her appear behind them; rather too close to Naruto. "You tough enough to handle this? You're not afraid are you?" The woman then took her hand and put it on his cheek before taking her finger taking a bit of Naruto's blood. "Guys like you don't usually last long in this forest."

Before she could take any more of the blood from Naruto's cheek, she took out another kunai to defend herself, when a long tongue holding her other kunai rolled out in front of her. The tongue was attached to the Grass Genin that the said kunai had barely missed. He/she held their straw hat while their tongue was stretched out pretty long for a normal human being. Shinji was actually surprised that the Genin actually got behind Anko so fast and so close without anyone actually noticing.

'_How did he do that?'_ Shinji thought to himself as he stared at the Grass genin. _'No Genin is _that_ fast! And what's with that tongue of his?'_

"I believe this is yours." The Grass ninja said in a smooth, feminine voice.

"Why thank you." Anko said with a slight smile, even though her other kunai was close to the person's tongue and ready to cut it off at a moment's notice. "You know, I recommend that you stand this close to me if you want to have a short life." Anko said before taking the other kunai and putting them both away.

The Grass Genin retracted their tongue. "I apologize; I got a little jumpy at the sight of blood and your blade slicing my hair." The person said with a slight grin that began to creep Asuka out. "I meant no harm."

Everyone just stared at the events, even Shinji, Asuka, and Rei. Shinji then heard something next to him. "N-Naruto-kun…" It was a low voice, almost as low as a whisper. Shinji turned his head to see the young Hyuuga heiress, Hinata, next to him looking very worried at Naruto.

Asuka stared at the young, pearl-eyed girl with a grin. _'Oh yeah, this girl's got it bad!'_

Rei simply stared at the Grass Genin as they walked away from Anko with scrutinizing eyes. _'There is something about this Grass ninja that doesn't seem to be in place. I do not know what it is, but for whatever reason, this Grass Genin is not who they appear to be.'_

Anko just simply grinned at the retreating Genin. "Everyone here's pretty quick-tempered. There must be something in the air." She then snickered. "This is gonna be fun."

Naruto just stared at the woman as if she were crazy. Anko then walked back to the fence and turned around to look at all the assembled Genin teams. "Now before we begin this stage of the Chuunin Exam, I have something to hand out to you all." She then pulled out a stack of papers. "Just a standard consent form. Before we begin, all of you are to read over this form, and then sign it."

It was Naruto who then voiced everyone's thoughts. "What for?"

Anko just grinned again. "Some of you may not come back alive from this test, and I have to get your consent to that risk." She then laughed. "Otherwise I'll be the one responsible." Everyone just kept staring at her and she then handed the papers to Naruto, who began passing them around. "Now I'll explain to you what happens on this test. The first thing is that this test will put all of your survival skills to the test."

This caused Asuka to grin. _'Sounds like my kind of place.'_

Anko then unraveled a scroll, which had a map of the forest. It showed that there were two halves of the forest, a river running through it, and a tower in the very middle of it. "Now, I'll give you a description of the terrain." Anko then explained what was on the map that included 44 entrance gates. That meant that the 26 teams would take 26 of them when they entered. The tower was ten kilometers away from each gate, which meant that the tower was indeed in the very middle of the forest area. Anko then rolled the map back up and pulled out two different scrolls; one was white with a brown center and there was a symbol of 'heaven' on it while the other had brown and white with 'earth' in kanji on it.

"It's an 'everything goes' fight to get your hands on these scrolls." She indicated the two in her hand. "You'll be fighting to get your hands on an earth scroll and a heaven scroll." She then looked at all of the teams again. "There are 26 teams participating in the test and half will be going after a heaven scroll and the other half will be going after an earth scroll. I'll hand one scroll to each team and that's what you'll be fighting for."

"So how do we pass the test?" Sasuke Uchiha asked, causing Sakura to look at him before Anko answered.

"Your entire team must bring both to the tower a heaven scroll and an earth scroll." She answered.

"That means more than half of us will fail." Sakura realized as she turned towards Anko. "More if not every team is able to get both the scrolls."

"No one said it would easy." Anko shrugged. "Oh, one more thing; the test has a time limit." She said, putting the scrolls in her trench coat. "You must finish it within five days."

"Five days!?" The blonde Genin, Ino Yamanaka shouted.

"What are we supposed to do for food!?" The chubby member of her team, Chouji Akamichi asked, almost in worry.

Anko just shrugged it off. "Just look around; the forest is full of plenty of things to eat. There's plenty to feed all of you."

Kabuto then turned to the other Genins behind him. "Yeah but the forest also has man-eating beasts and poisonous plants in there."

That only caused a groan from the young Akamichi heir. "Oh quiet down, this is why they call it 'survival' you know." His blonde teammate said to him.

"That means with these circumstances there's no chance that half the teams will pass the test." The other member of the Hyuuga Clan participating in the exams, Neji Hyuuga, said.

"And with the days getting longer, the nights getting shorter; we'll be getting less time to sleep and less time to recover." A green, spandex-wearing boy that Shinji identified as Rock Lee (from Kabuto's description of him) said before grinning himself. "It is a challenge indeed!"

Asuka laughed in her head when she heard that. _'I like this guy!'_

"Completely surrounded by enemies…" Sasuke Uchiha began. "There won't be time to rest and we'll have to keep a constant watch."

"That also means that each team will be exhausted by the time they _do_ reach the tower." Rei added her two cents to the situation.

"Right," Anko confirmed. "This test is also a test of endurance behind enemy lines. This is a grueling test and I'm sure _some_ of you may not be up to the challenge." When she said that, she looked at Shinji and Hinata in particular, causing the two to wince. Then one of the Genins, Shikamaru Nara raised his hand.

"So can we set an example, let's say we want to quit." The lazy boy asked.

Anko turned to him. "Nope, in the middle of a battle you can't quit!" She then grinned and laughed. "You could try, but you might get killed for it."

"Oh how troublesome." The boy mumbled, crossing his arms.

Anko then turned to the rest of the teams again. "But there are also ways that you can get disqualified." She then raised her hand and held up a finger to indicate. "One, if a full team can't make it to the tower with both scrolls. Two, if a team loses a member or if a team member is incapacitated and cannot continue. But the most importantly, none of you and I mean _none_ of you may look at the contents of the scrolls until you've reached the tower."

"What if we read it by accident?" Naruto asked.

"Sorry, but it's a secret." Anko said with another grin causing Naruto to groan. "There will be times that a ninja will be given top secret documents. The scrolls will be there to test your integrity. And that's it."

"So basically," Asuka began, causing everyone to look at her. "It's like we're behind enemy lines, with secret documents (which we can't read), in a forest where we could easily get killed, and we'll be heading to a place where we might not make it alive or with full strength." Then Asuka grinned maliciously. "Sounds like fun to me."

This caused a grin to cross Anko's face again. _'I'm beginning to like this kid.'_ She then turned serious again. "Right, now each teams, take your consent forms and exchange them over there for your scrolls." She pointed towards a stand where three Chuunin proctors waited for them. "After that, each team will pick a gate and you'll be let inside." Anko then sighed. "Oh and one more piece of advice…" She then looked at all of them. "Just don't die!"

Later, everyone split up to sign their consent forms. Shinji took it upon himself to think over the whole test. _'So, all we have to do is fight a team for a scroll we need and survive our way to the tower. They make it sound so easy; but it's not.'_

Rei, on the other hand, observed as they covered the stand with a curtain. _'I see, so they are making it so that no one knows which teams will have which scrolls. We also will not know which one will _have _the scroll.'_ She then looked at her consent form. _'This will make the test prove to be even _more_ difficult.'_

Asuka was finishing her consent form as she also thought about the test. _'Ok, so we probably won't be able to get any sleep in peace, so one of us will have to stay watch while the others sleep. But we'll have to take turns so that we'll be at full strength when we continue our fight to the tower.'_ She then grinned. _'Well, it's about time I put my fighting skills to the test too.'_

Shinji walked around and spotted Naruto walking towards a tree where Hinata Hyuuga was leaning against. She noticed that the two exchanged words and the young girl tried to hand Naruto something before walking away. Shinji had to shake his head at this; it was obvious the girl had a crush on Naruto, but he was too dense to even notice! Shinji made it one of his personal goals, besides finding more about the blonde-haired ninja, to get those two together.

Later, Team Katsuragi had finished reading and signing their consent forms and exchanged them for an Earth Scroll. They now waited outside a gate marked as number 2. They each had different reactions to the wait; Rei was just calm and collected, considering she hardly shows emotion, Asuka was psyched about the whole thing and was anxious to fight, but Shinji was a the nervous one out of all three of them; he wasn't sure if they'd make it.

"Ok!" Asuka exclaimed as she pumped her fist in the air. "We've got all our survival gear, our weapons, and our skills. All we need to do is just find a team that has a heaven scroll and we'll be hard pressed for the tower!" She started throwing some punches in mid air. "Simple as that."

"It will not be as simple as it may sound, Asuka-san." Rei said, interrupting her teammate's reverie. "We do not know which teams have a heaven scroll or not. For all we know, we may end up facing a team with another earth scroll."

Asuka just grinned and turned her head towards Rei. "Good, that just means it'll be even _more_ fun when I kick their asses!"

'_That's easy for _you_ to say, Asuka.'_ Shinji thought to himself. _'I'm not so sure if we will even _make it_ to the tower alive.'_

"We'll just have to play this one by ear." Asuka said as she turned her attention to the gate in front of them. "We'll only stop to eat, sleep, bathe, and fight. So don't you two lag behind, got it!?" Asuka shouted causing a simultaneous nod from her two teammates.

The Chuunin in front of them unlocked the gate and then glanced at their watch. Just then, the clock struck 2:30 PM. The second test had begun. The moment the gate in front of them opened, Team Katsuragi began to sprint into the forest. They were on their own for the next five days; with enemies all around them.

**TBC…**

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A/n: OK, now I'm gonna have to end the chapter here; the next chapter is where Team Katsuragi will be put to the test in their jutsus. So start sending in more people; this is where the whole story's action begins! 


	7. Chapter 6

A/N: Here I go with the second part to the Forest of Death. Now I know some of you maybe hoping that they'll run into Team 7 along the way, but no. I have something else planned for Team Katsuragi.

Disclaimer: See previous chapters.

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Chapter 6

Trees whipped by them as Team Katsuragi leapt from tree branch to tree branch. The breeze from their trek flapped their outfits and rustled their hair. They were set for one goal: to get to the tower before anyone else. But as they, and many other teams, found out it was definitely not an easy task. So far, an hour has gone by since they entered the so-called, "Forest of Death" and they have yet to come across another team. When they entered, they heard the screams of another team from a good distance; that meant that the fighting and trapping of other teams had begun. If Shinji hadn't been scared before, he was now; even so, he had to at least try to be brave for the girls' sakes.

They landed in a clearing less than a kilometer into the forest and looked around; there was no sign of other teams approaching. Rei felt the chakra signatures of every living thing in the forest, but she could barely feel the chakra signatures of the other teams with the other flora and fauna proving it to be impossible. Asuka was waiting as patient as she could, but it was not helping; she wanted to fight another team to show her skills more than anything.

"I do not detect any chakra signatures nearby," Rei stated as she turned her head around to face her teammates. "We can stop here for a moment to handle our…personal things." She tried to avoid saying the word that was usually said.

Asuka, on the other hand, didn't. "Ok, potty break," She pointed to a patch of bushes. "Shinji, you can go into those bushes." She then pointed her thumb towards a thicker patch behind a large tree. "Wonder Girl and I can go here." But before Shinji could go, Asuka stopped him. "But be careful as you go, we don't want another team to send one of their Genin to use you for a henge jutsu." Shinji nodded and went behind the bushes, as did the girls.

After a few minutes, all three of them came out of their bushes and checked each other for any changes just in case one of them had been someone in a henge jutsu. Seeing that they were all the same people as they knew, they sat down in the clearing and looked up the trees. Shinji had pulled out a nutrition bar and began to eat it. He hated the taste, but what the nutrition bar lacked in taste it made up for his appetite. Asuka and Rei pulled out similar bars and began to eat them as well.

"You know," Asuka said with her mouth full before swallowing the chunk of food in her mouth. "This whole exam has got me thinking about something."

"What's that Asuka?" Shinji asked after gulping another bite of his nutrition bar.

Asuka looked down in deep thought. "What will happen when we become Chuunin?" Before her team could answer she continued. "I mean, I know our missions will be tougher and our pay will be a bit higher," She then looked at her two teammates. "But what will become of all three of us?"

Shinji didn't have an answer, but Rei did. "The assignments we will be given will vary." She said. "We could end up as instructors at the academy, we may end up being guards at our village's places of interest, or we could end up being assigned to a Jounin who will be our leader in many missions."

"Well one thing's for sure," Asuka said as she finished her bar. "I _don't_ wanna end up training brats at the academy!"

"You might have to Asuka-san." Rei interjected, finishing her nutrition bar. "We must be aware of our assignments given to us by the Tsubasakage."

Asuka simply glowered at Rei. "Sometimes I wonder if you're too loyal for your own good, Wonder Girl."

"Can we please not argue about it?" Shinji said, trying to defuse the situation before it gets out of hand. He hated it when the two of them were like that; while it may seem like a one-sided argument for many, Shinji knew otherwise.

"Who asked you, Baka?!" Asuka snapped, turning her head towards Shinji, who flinched at her response.

Before Shinji could apologize, they heard the sound of something whistling towards them causing Rei to shout in alarm. "Scatter!" When the three of them separated, three sets of kunai embedded themselves into the ground that they once occupied. The three of them looked up to see a team of Leaf Genin with sickly smirks on their faces standing on a tree limb.

"Well, looks like we missed guys." The middle one said.

"They were loud enough, I was sure we could hit 'em with our eyes closed." The one on the left joked as he spun a kunai on his left index finger.

"Well, at least now we can see if these Tentou ninjas are good fighters." The one on the right spoke as he crouched down looking at the three ninjas in question, who stared back with mixed emotions.

"Well, you're just gonna have to come down here and find out." Asuka said as she pulled out a kunai of her own.

With that, the two teams leapt at each other and for the next several minutes, the echoes of their fight went through the forest. After those few minutes, the three Leaf Genins were lying on the ground; all unconscious. Shinji panted to try and catch his breath but Asuka and Rei breathed normally.

"Ok, Wonder Girl, check 'em and see if they have the scroll we need." Asuka told Rei, who complied.

Rei shook her head after she inspected each one. "I am afraid they do not have the scroll we require." She pulled out an Earth scroll causing Asuka to growl in frustration.

"Ugh! All that for _nothing_!" She then took a deep breath to calm herself before turning to Rei and Shinji. "No matter, let them keep that scroll. But let's keep moving; we _have_ to get to that tower!"

"Hai!" Shinji and Rei said at the same time before the three of them leapt off again.

Two hours later Rei stopped onto a tree limb, causing Shinji and Asuka to do the same. When they turned to look at Rei, she looked like she had been dipped in cold water and pulled out as quickly as she was dropped. She was shaking all over her body, her eyes were wide and she could barely breathe right.

"What's up Wonder Girl?" Asuka asked, with slight concern. "You look like you've just seen a ghost."

"What's wrong?" Shinji asked with great concern.

"I…" Rei stammered, almost uncharacteristically. "I felt…something…"

Shinji and Asuka exchanged looks in puzzlement before looking at Rei again. "What was it?" Asuka asked.

"I felt a strong chakra surge…"Rei said with her voice almost betraying her emotions. "It felt…powerful…malevolent…Someone very powerful is in this forest right now."

That was when Shinji spotted something move. "Over there!" He pointed causing the girls to look.

What they saw was a person; _who_ they saw, was what concerned them. It was the Grass Genin from before; this time he/she was alone and moving…but they looked as though they were melting _into_ the trees! Team Katsuragi made a silent approach to watch the person, hoping they would lead them to their team; but they stopped as they saw the person stop in the middle of the tree as though they were part of it. Not wanting to attract their attention, Team Katsuragi did their best to hide. So far, the person they had been following had not spotted them. If they knew, they chose to ignore them. Just then, the violet-haired Jounin proctor, Anko leapt onto a branch right in front of the person. From the look on her face, she was not happy to see this person.

Then, in a smooth, _masculine_ voice, the person spoke. "It's been a long time, Anko-chan."

The change in voice stunned Team Katsuragi; hours ago the person talked like they were a woman. But right now, they were talking as though they were a man! Then Shinji noticed something, the person's face looked…torn up right around the left eye. Indeed the face of the person they saw looked like it was a mask of some kind. Behind the mask was grayish, pale skin that rivaled Rei's and a serpentine eye much like a snake's.

"Take a look at his face!" Shinji whispered urgently and the girls did and were equally shocked as he was.

"I thought that person was not who they seemed." Rei whispered, narrowing her eyes at the person.

"Yeah," Asuka nodded in her own whisper. "But who is that?"

"This is no time to reminisce!" Anko snapped, which stunned the three Tentou-nins; she was usually so sadistically cheeky; now, she looked pissed. "You're an S-ranked criminal so it's my job to defeat you. After all, you taught me everything I know." She then pulled out for senbon in her right hand. "Isn't that right," She then narrowed her eyes and spat out the next word. "Orochimaru?"

The moment she had said that name, Rei's eyes widened like dinner plates. She then turned to her two teammates and whispered very frantically. "We have to get out of here!"

"What are you…?" Asuka began but she was interrupted by Rei's urgent whisper. "Now!" Asuka had no time to argue and all three of them leapt off as fast as they could.

After a few minutes of leaping through the trees the three of them stopped at a large tree branch about four hundred meters from the scene they had just witnessed. They all sat down to catch their breath as Rei had gone so fast that Asuka and Shinji had trouble keeping up with her. They had never seen her act this way before at all. Rei was usually calm, collected, and rarely expressed her emotions.

"What's up with you Wonder Girl?" Asuka said through her panted words. "Why did you have us get away from there so fast?"

Rei turned to the two of them. "Did you not hear the name the proctor called that man?"

"Yeah I heard it," Asuka said, managing to catch her breath. "But what does that have to do…"

"Do you not know who Orochimaru is?" Rei interrupted her in almost a panic with her voice level being raised. That surprised Shinji and Asuka; Rei hardly ever raised her voice like that. "Orochimaru is one of the three legendary Sannin!"

That revelation caused Shinji and Asuka's eyes to widen and them both to take sharp intakes of breath. Shinji was the first to recover from his shock. "A-are you sure?"

Rei looked back to where they had come from. "I have no doubt about it. It _was_ him!"

Asuka then found her voice. "What's he _doing_ here, though? Why is he in the Chuunin Exam?"

Rei shook her head. "I do not know;" She said before looking towards the tower. "But whatever it is, we must find a team with a heaven scroll and get to the tower as soon as possible. We must inform Misato-sensei about this!"

Asuka's face turned serious. "For once, Wonder Girl, I agree." She then turned to Shinji. "Let's go!"

With that the team leapt away again not knowing if Orochimaru had known of their presence or not. If he did know that they were there, he chose to ignore them seeing as though the forest might kill them first or that they posed no threat to his plans. The three of them had no idea what had happened prior to their discovery of Orochimaru.

That night, they decided to stop and hide inside the hollow confines of a large tree trunk. The hollow area was large enough that all three of them could fit inside and there was an opening so they could start a fire, thanks to one of Asuka's fire jutsus. After eating their dinner, the girls decided that it was time to go to sleep and Shinji volunteered to stand watch while they slept. They also agreed that if he started to get tired he would wake one of them up and take over and then they would wake up the other person until morning. Shinji simply stared into the flames as he recalled the earlier days of the exam; from their encounter with Gaara and his team, to the events before the first test, and to the recent scene they had just witnessed.

'_What is going _on_ here?'_ Shinji thought to himself. _'First Gaara, then those Sound ninjas, and now Orochimaru has been added to this! Something about this year's Chuunin Exam is starting to bug me and I can't figure out what.'_

He stopped his thoughts as he heard something stir. He turned to see Asuka waking up and rubbing her left eye. She yawned and walked to go sit next to Shinji.

"Something bothering you Shinji?" She whispered.

Shinji nodded, "Yeah, it's about the whole exam." He turned his head to face hers. "First our encounter with that Sunagakure team, then those Otogakure ninjas, and now Orochimaru." He then turned to face the flames again. "Something is about to happen in Konoha…and I'm beginning to suspect that we're somehow caught in the middle of all of it."

Asuka looked at him with uncertainty in her eyes. "Do you think Misato-sensei knew about this and not bother to tell us?"

Shinji shook his head. "I don't know." He then looked outside of the tree. "If she didn't then I don't see any reason why she shouldn't."

Asuka just stared at Shinji with concern written on her face. While she won't admit it, to even herself, she always felt great concern about Shinji. The boy always felt like he had the whole weight of the world on his shoulders and that his existence meant nothing. He always apologized (and it always annoyed her when he did) for everything he thinks he's done wrong. She had known that his father abandoning him had caused him to lose all self-confidence in himself. It sickened her that his father had done that to him because she also felt the same way when her mother hanged herself. While she had learned to mask her pain of losing her mother, Shinji never did.

The Massacre thirteen years ago had changed everyone in their village, including her. Shinji had been affected the most by it because it had killed her mother and made his father leave him as if he were a useless runt of the litter! But despite everything, Shinji still became a ninja and had helped them on several missions. The two B-ranked missions they had been on were mostly his success. So far in the exam, the reason they had accomplished those two missions never showed.

Asuka had always berated Shinji about his current attitude and always told him to "grow a spine". Somehow, in this year's Chuunin Exam, it seems to be finally happening. First there was his decision to stay for the first test, which had a huge affect on their emotions. Then there was the fight they had with that team of Leaf Genin not too long ago. Shinji had definitely been starting to grow up in this exam. She had wondered if he'd finally be able to grow that "spine" she had kept telling him to grow for so long.

"C'mon, Shinji," Asuka whispered as she patted his back. "Go get some sleep, I'll stand watch now."

Shinji nodded silently before going to lie down. Asuka stared at him as he slowly fell asleep with a mixture of emotions. She then sat there and started to look at the flames in front of her; wondering what the next four days had in store for them.

The next day, Team Katsuragi had been on the move again. This time though, they encountered a team from Sunagakure. It wasn't Gaara's, but they were stronger foes than the Leaf Genin team they had fought the day before. It was difficult, but the team pulled through. However, like the previous team, this one also had an Earth scroll. It was on the third day that they had stopped by a river in the forest.

"UGH!!! Three days and we _still_ haven't found a team with a Heaven Scroll!" Asuka shouted in frustration as she slapped the water, causing it to splash.

"Calm down Asuka," Shinji said as he drank from his canteen of water. "I'm sure we'll find a team that still has one."

Rei had just drinking her fill of water as well. "It may not be as simple as that."

"How can it be _not_ simple, Wonder Girl!?" Asuka barked as she snapped her head around to face Rei.

"For all we know, all of the Heaven Scrolls have either been taken," She then took another sip of her water. "Or some of the other teams have broken the rules and have read their heaven scrolls, or some of the heaven scrolls may have been destroyed."

That caused Asuka to pale. "Well then, what do you suggest; if you're so smart?" Asuka said as she crossed her arms.

Rei looked down at the water. "Perhaps," She then looked at her two teammates. "We should let someone come to _us_."

Shinji got was Rei was suggesting. "You mean lay a trap."

Rei nodded. "Exactly."

Later, the team had sat down to eat their lunch, which was fish in Shinji and Asuka's case. Rei had, of course, declined and had managed to find some edible plants for herself. Unknown to them, they were being watched from another team hidden in the trees. The team was from Takigakure, the Village Hidden behind the Waterfall. The three of them simply grinned at the luck; they had hoped to get a shot at the team from Tentougakure and there they were, just ripe for the picking.

"What do you think, Taki?" One of them asked, looking at their leader.

"The idiots don't think we're coming, that's what I think, Bouki." Their leader, Taki, replied.

"Then what do you say we go and take their scroll from them?" Their third member, Tatsu, suggested.

With that the three Waterfall ninjas charged, but Tatsu stepped on a tripwire, activating a trap. Several Kunai came at them from beyond the trees of where they had stepped over the tripwire. Seeing them, they managed to jump out of the way and throw their own shuriken at the three unsuspecting Tentougakure ninjas. But the three they attacked suddenly turned into puddles of water the moment their shuriken touched them!

"Water clones!?" Tatsu cried in surprise as he was suddenly attacked from behind by Asuka, who delivered a flying kick to his back.

The other two landed near the bank of the river as they saw Tatsu being kicked back into the forest by Asuka. Suddenly a huge fog bank began to fill the area. They knew of only one jutsu that was capable of this.

"A Kirigakure jutsu!" Bouki cried, but he was then grabbed from behind and lost consciousness.

Just then Tatsu was thrown out of the forest as the mist began to clear. On the ground lay Tatsu and Bouki; beat up and down for the count. Taki turned to see the assailants of his teammates and saw the three Tentougakure ninjas. Asuka stood in the middle with her left hand in a fist and resting on her hip while the other fiddled with a kunai. Rei stood to her left with her left hand in a hand sign and her eyes closed. Shinji stood to her left in a defensive stance and holding a kunai.

"Well, now that we've taken care of your teammates," Asuka said as she stopped fiddling with the kunai and prepped it for a fight. "How 'bout you make it easy on yourself and hand over your scroll?"

Taki merely smirked. "Oh please, like I'm gonna give it up just because you took out my teammates with those cheap tricks of yours?" He then leapt to the water, used his chakra to walk on it, and brought his hands together and made a series of hand seals before completing it with a tiger hand seal. "Suiton: Daibakufu no jutsu!"

With that a huge wave of water began swirling its way towards the three Tentou-nin, who jumped out of the way in the nick of time. Shinji then took his kunai and threw it at the Waterfall ninja, who released the chakra in his feet to dive into the water to avoid it. Shinji landed by the bank just as the Waterfall ninja leapt out of the river and towards him.

At the same moment, Asuka landed on the other side of the bank and shouted to Shinji. "Move Shinji!"

Shinji complied as he jumped out of the way of the older ninja's fist, which crashed into the rocks causing them to explode in different directions. On the other side of the river, Asuka had made a few hand signs herself and finished before shouting her attack.

"Katon: Gokakyu no jutsu!"

She then took her hand to her mouth and breathed out a giant fireball at Taki, who just stood there making the same hand signs as he did before. The two attacks collided with a large plume of steam that covered the area. It was so thick, Taki didn't see the punch that Asuka had thrown herself into when the attacks collided before it was too late.

He skidded across the rocks and came to a stop, where Shinji waited for him to do so. Shinji threw a set of shuriken into the Genin's back that connected. Taki yelped in pain and tried to ignore it as he brought his foot to kick Shinji. Shinji merely sidestepped the attack and grabbed his foot before delivering a kick of his own to Taki's stomach.

Asuka then looked out towards the water. "Anytime you're ready Wonder Girl!"

Taki looked towards the water, where Rei was standing on it going through a long series of hand seals. Behind her, the water in which she stood on began to stir like an ocean. Taki realized that Shinji and Asuka's attacks had been diversions and turned his sights on Rei. He didn't get far as Rei finished the last of the hand seals before looking directly at Taki as he charged at her.

"Suiton: Suiryudon no jutsu!"

Behind her, a large column of water rose into the air and the water itself became the very image of a dragon's head. The column then charged at Taki, who was caught unprepared by the attack. The water slammed into him hard and it covered the rocky bank of the river. When the water receded, Taki laid there coughing up all the water that had filled his lungs when it had connected. Team Katsuragi stood over him; Asuka with a grin.

"Now," She said bringing the kunai close to his throat. "About that scroll…"

Taki hesitantly went into his pack and pulled out the scroll. To Team Katsuragi's relief, it was a heaven scroll! Asuka took the scroll, and quickly pulled out the three shuriken that had been embedded into Taki's back. Taki grunted in pain when she did that, but Asuka then took the three shuriken to the water and cleaned them off while Rei applied a genjutsu to put Taki to sleep. Shinji then brought himself to the three Waterfall ninjas and put his palms to their wounded bodies.

"Shosen no jutsu." He said softly and he began to heal their wounds.

Asuka shook her head at this. No matter who Shinji was up against, he always regretted harming his opponents. Being the medic-nin of their team, Shinji had to be taught various medical techniques to help heal his teammates. Even though they were his opponents today, Shinji felt that he would some day end up fighting alongside these three one day. After he finished healing the three ninjas, he gathered up his belongings and met up with his team.

"Ok guys," Asuka said as she turned to look at the tower directly in front of them. "We've got the scrolls we need, now let's head to that tower!" With that, the three of them leapt across the river and into the other part of the forest.

For the next few hours, Team Katsuragi had zipped through the forest without confrontation or opposition to the tower. They had encountered a few of the wild animals that had tried to kill them, but they fought them off easily. When they arrived at the tower, they found a few entrances into it and chose to go into the one they saw first. Once inside, they noticed that there was a room. On the wall of the room was an inscription.

"'If you do not possess Heaven, gain knowledge and be prepared.'" Asuka read. "'If you do not possess Earth, run through the fields and seek strength. If you open both Heaven and Earth Scrolls, dangerous paths turn into safe ones. This is the secret of something, something. It shall lead you on your way.'"

"What do you think it means, Asuka?" Shinji asked looking at her.

Asuka turned to him. "Well, duh! It means we can open the scrolls now, Baka!"

"Yes," Rei nodded. "But I believe we are to open them both at the same time."

"Thanks for pointing that out, Wonder Girl." Asuka said sarcastically, rolling her eyes.

Shinji handed Asuka the Earth scroll while he had the Heaven scroll and then turned to her. "Ok, we'll open them both at the count of three." She said which he nodded.

"Alright one…"

Shinji gulped, hoping that nothing would happen.

"…Two…"

They both readied the scrolls to open.

"…Three!" They both opened the scrolls at the same time and prepared for the worst. But nothing happened; there was no dangerous seal, no ninja coming out of the scroll to hurt them…nothing. Inside there were markings; two of which were surrounded by a seal of some kind. They were different, but they could read them.

"'Person?'" Shinji read his scroll.

"'Jin?'" Asuka read from hers.

Just the two symbols bulged out and smoke began to come out of them. Rei realized what they were. "Summoning seals! Shinji, Asuka, drop the scrolls!"

Shinji and Asuka complied without argument and the two scrolls dropped to the floor. When the two came together, a large puff of smoke came out of the both of them and Team Katsuragi stood back and waited for whatever came. When the smoke cleared, a man stood there. He was tall, no taller than Misato; he had tanned skin, brown eyes, and brown hair tied in a ponytail behind his head. Across the man's nose was a scar. He wore the outfit of a Chuunin from Konoha and was smiling at the three Heaven ninjas.

"Greetings." The man said. "My name is Iruka Umino, and I welcome all three of you and congratulate all of you for making it this far into the exam."

Team Katsuragi just continued to stare at the man after he introduced himself. The man, who identified himself as Iruka, took out a pocket watch and checked it. Satisfied, he closed it and put the watch away.

"Well, the three of you made it with only 56 hours to go." He said again causing the two of the three to smile. "I'm happy to announce that all three of you have passed the second test of the exam." This gave Asuka a grin.

"I see," Rei said suddenly, causing all the occupants of the room to look at her. "Now I see what would have happened had we opened the scrolls. A Chuunin from this village would use a sleeping genjutsu on us to keep us sedated until the test was complete. Am I correct in this assumption?"

Iruka grinned at her. "That is correct." He then went and picked up one of the scrolls. "This test was to test how well the three of you could complete a mission. And I must say you've done quite well."

"Umm, Iruka-san?" Shinji said, catching the man's attention. "What does the inscription on that wall mean?" He asked pointing to it.

This caused Iruka to grin again. "Well, that's exactly what I'm here for." He had their attention now. "This inscription is a principle that our Kage wants you to remember as Chuunin."

"A principle?" Asuka echoed, blinking her eyes.

"Yes, the 'heaven' in this inscription refers to the head of a person," He began to explain. "And 'earth' refers to the body." He turned to face the three of them. "'If you do not possess Heaven, gain knowledge and be prepared' means if you lack knowledge, you should study and prepare before your missions." He then pointed to the other half of the inscription. "'If you do not possess Earth, run through the fields and seek strength' means that if you lack the strength you need, you should train your body for that strength." He then indicated the other part of the inscription. "And where if you have both Heaven and Earth means that if you have both strength and knowledge, you are Ok."

Asuka then pointed to the blank spot. "Then what about that missing word?"

Iruka grinned. "It is the letter that symbolizes a Chuunin." He then showed them the Earth scroll that he held. "The 'human' letter that was in this scroll goes there." He then lowered the scroll. "The test you took the past three and a half days tested the basic abilities of the examinees as a Chuunin," He then smiled at the three of them. "And the three of you passed it." His face then turned serious as he explained how important a Chuunin is. "Never forget this principle and go on to the next step. That's all I was ordered to tell you." He smiled again. "I wish you all the best of luck." He then disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Team Katsuragi was then instructed to find themselves a room in the tower, which they did. All the while they kept wondering what the third and final part of the exam was. One thing was for sure, whatever the next part was; they would face it together…as a team. They had no idea of the events that would soon follow the third test.

**TBC…**

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A/N: OK folks, that's it for chapter 6. Now the next chapter is where their strength will be put to the ultimate test. Now don't be surprised by some of the changes I'll be making in the next chapter. I made these changes necessary so that Team Katsuragi would all pass the next exam. I won't tell you what it is, all you need to know is that it will reveal much of their abilities. 


	8. Chapter 7

A/N: Here I go with the third part of the Exam. Now before anyone asks if I'm gonna keep Kabuto in, think again. Just read and find out.

Disclaimer: See previous chapters.

* * *

_Chapter 7_

The next two days had been boring for Asuka; she, Shinji, and Rei had gotten to the tower as one of the first few teams to actually make it. One of the Konoha rookie teams and the team from Suna that they had encountered when they arrived for the Chuunin Exams had both made it to the tower before they did. They didn't bother to mingle with the two teams, nor did they want to ask the team from Konoha about Naruto. Another team from Konoha arrived shortly after they did; they were only familiar with this team from their passing the first part of the Chuunin Exam and seeing them with the other 24 teams that had passed the first exam. Then the team with the second member of the Hyuuga clan arrived, followed by the team from Sound, the second rookie team, and another team that had the Genin they knew as Kabuto in it. Last, but not least, Naruto's team arrived, but at the very last minute.

It was the end of the fifth day and all the teams that had passed the second test were called to assemble in an arena inside the tower. The arena itself was enormous; Shinji figured it would be at least fifty feet tall and twenty feet wide. To the sides of the arena stood a single railing that went around the arena and around a statue that looked like a pair of hands in a ram hand seal. The twenty-seven Genins that had passed the second test all stood in nine rows of three in the middle of the arena staring up at the people in front of them. In front of them were the Jounin instructors of each team, the two proctors from the previous test, the Chuunin Team Katsuragi had met earlier, and three more Leaf Ninjas. The one person, who stood out of them all, stood in the very middle of the assembled higher-ranking ninja.

The man they were looking at was none other than the Hokage of Konoha. The man looked like he was somewhere in his late 70s and early 80s. He wore the standard Kage robes that were present on all Kages, including Tentougakure's Tsubasakage and a hat that had the kanji symbol for fire. Despite his age, the man displayed years of wisdom, burdens, and pain in his eyes as well as great strength. Team Katsuragi knew better than to underestimate a man like him; he was not the Hokage for nothing.

Between the Sand village Jounin and the Sound village Jounin stood Misato. She wore a proud smile as she saw her three students standing with the other assembled ninja before her. She had to admit that she had doubts that the three of them would make it to the tower alive or in one piece. She noted that the three of them had shown signs of fatigue and a few wounds from their ordeal in the forest. She couldn't be even more proud of them than she was already.

'_So they all made it,'_ She thought to herself. _'Thank god, I was beginning to worry that they wouldn't.'_ Her attention then focused on two shinobi in particular; namely Naruto and Gaara. _'This Gaara kid made it too; but so did Naruto.'_ She then noticed that Naruto's teammate, Sasuke Uchiha was holding his neck. _'What's up with his teammate? Why's he rubbing his neck like that?'_

At the same time, Shinji and the others were looking around them at all the teams that had passed. They were also glad that Naruto's team had made it, as well as concerned that the Sunagakure team had passed as well. Rei noted that the dog belonging to Kiba Inuzuka, Akamaru, was scared out of his wits.

'_That dog must sense something coming from one of the examinees.'_ She thought as she looked at the white-furred pooch. _'But which one is he scared of?'_

Their attention was drawn by Anko as she spoke. "Congratulations to all of you for passing the second test." She looked over the examinees and was quite surprised at how many there were. _'Twenty-seven out of Seventy-eight; that's a lot more than what I expected; this year's examinees must be that good.'_ She thought as she looked them all over. "Now we'll have an explanation on the third test by Hokage-sama. So listen up, and listen well." She then turned to the Hokage. "I leave them to you Hokage-sama."

The elderly man stepped forward, cleared his throat and looked at the examinees as he spoke. "Before we begin the third test, there's one thing I wish to make clear to all of you." This gave cause for looks of puzzlement from the Genin present. "It concerns the true purpose of this exam."

'_What's this old geezer talking about?'_ Asuka thought to herself as she stared at the Hokage.

The Hokage continued his explanation. "Why do we do a joint exam with the allied nations?" He adjusted his hat. "'To maintain good relations with allied nations' and 'heighten the level of ninja'; don't let these reasons deceive you. The 'exam', so to speak…" He took out his pipe and breathed out a plume of smoke before looking at all of them. "…The epitome of war between the allied nations."

The girl on Team Gai, Tenten, was who spoke next. "What do you mean?"

The Hokage then went through a long explanation that the exam was made to decrease military power and that it still holds its purpose as a way of selecting ninja who are worthy of the title of Chuunin. A few of the examinees, including Team Katsuragi questioned him at a few points in his explanation and he answered in great detail. He also told them that it was where each ninja would fight and carry the dignity of their home nation. He also explained that some of the daimyos and other various famous people would be invited to become eventual clients for the nations and see the battles between the Genins. The Hokage was clear in every detail for the reasons the Chuunin exam was created without leaving a thing out; even to the point where he explained of why the ninjas fight.

After a couple of comments from Gaara and Naruto, the Hokage was going to finish his explanation with the explanation of the third test. "Now to explain the third test, but before that…" He then cleared his throat.

After he did, a ninja from Konoha leapt down and kneeled before him. They couldn't see his face, due to the fact that his back was turned on the assembled Genin. "Excuse me, Hokage-sama." He spoke in almost a raspy voice. "Allow me, Hayate Gekkou, the judge of the test, explain it to them."

The Hokage nodded and the man turned to the gathered Ninja. At first glance, the man looked like he was too sick to even _be_ a ninja; however, Rei noted that it was a deception of appearance. The man had bags under his eyes and looked a little pale, but not as pale as Rei.

"I am pleased to meet all of you." He said before letting out a slight cough. "However, before we begin…" He let out another cough. "There is something I need you to do…" He let out another series of coughs before looking at them with a smirk.

'_This guy could use a lozenge for that throat of his.'_ Shinji thought as he stared blankly at the sickly-looking man.

"We have to have a preliminary exam before we can move on to the real one." The man said as he looked at all of them.

"What do you mean by that?" Shikamaru Nara asked from his place with his team.

"Uh, excuse me, but why do we have to have these preliminaries? Can't we just move on to the next exam?" Sakura Haruno asked as she looked at Hayate.

"You see," the man said before coughing again. "The first and second tests might've been too easy. We never anticipated so many of you to still be here." He then looked them all over. "According to the rules of the exam, a preliminary round can be held at any stage in order to reduce the number of candidates remaining."

"B-but, is that fair?" Sakura stammered.

"We just have to speed things up a bit at this stage." Hayate answered. "As Hokage-sama explained, a lot of important guests will be watching you fight. We can't afford to waste their time. They only come to see the best out of all of you." He then pulled out a clipboard. "So if there are any among you who don't feel physically fit to go on, now's the time to…" Before he could keep going he let out another series of coughs causing a few looks of concern from some of the examinees. "Sorry about that. As I was saying; if any of you don't feel that you're up to this, now's the time for you to bail out; the preliminaries will be starting immediately."

"Come on, you mean right now?!" Kiba Inuzuka exclaimed.

"We just finished the last bit of the previous exam, don't we get a break?" Ino Yamanaka whined a little. Her teammate, Shikamaru muttered something about something being 'troublesome', while the other one whined about when they could eat.

"By the way, the winners will be determined through one-on-one combat. So like I said if there's anyone not up to it, now's the time to raise your hand." Hayate said again.

"Well I'm, sure as hell, not quitting." Asuka said, crossing her arms. "I came all this way to become a Chuunin and I'm not backing down now."

Misato smiled as she heard that. _'That's Asuka for you, always a competitor.'_

Shinji, on the other hand was debating with himself, again. _'So, I can avoid fighting if I quit?'_ He then shook his head. _'No, I came all this way myself, so I might as well go all the way!'_

At that moment, Shinji noticed that Naruto's teammate, Sasuke, was once again holding the back of his neck in pain. He could barely hear Sakura whisper to him about quitting or the reason why. He then felt Rei tap his shoulder; he turned to look at her.

"Shinji-kun, if you wish to quit, now is your chance." She suggested in a whisper; but to her surprise, he smiled and shook his head.

"No, Rei-chan," He said before looking into her red eyes. "I came this far in this exam, and I'm not going to quit now."

That surprised both Asuka and Rei. For Shinji _not_ to quit was almost unheard of! Shinji was the type of person who didn't like to fight unless it meant protecting the ones he cared about.

"Are you sure, Shinji?" Asuka said as she turned to look at him. "Seriously, if you wanna quit, you can just say so."

Shinji turned to her with a look of determination. "I made a promise to myself that I wouldn't run away again; and I won't back down on my word."

Asuka just stared blankly at Shinji; he was _really_ willing to keep going in the exam even if it meant fighting someone! This was definitely _not_ the Shinji she knew! The guy was as timid as a rabbit and would try to avoid fights period. She continued to stare at Shinji and he stared back with that look of determination that she could see in his eyes; she could also look for a bit of pleading. She assumed that he was also pleading her to let him keep going. She then gave him a smile and he returned it.

Up front, the Hokage, Anko, and Ibiki were all concerned about a certain survivor of the Uchiha Clan.

"It's as I feared." Sarutobi said.

"What do we do with him?" Ibiki asked.

"We have to pull him out and hand him over to black ops and have him locked up." Anko replied for the Hokage. "We have to keep that curse mark under control…"

Before she continued, Kakashi interrupted her. "Oh and he's just going to go quietly with all of this huh?" He asked in a sarcastic tone, causing the Leaf ninjas to look at him. They had a little argument about Sasuke staying in the exam. Misato, being not to far from the conversation, couldn't help but listen in.

'_What are they talking about?'_ She then turned to look at Sasuke. _'What kind of curse seal are they talking about here and why is it focused on Uchiha over there?'_

Just then, one of the Genins raised their hands; it was Kabuto Yakuchi. Everyone stared at him as he did. The ones who seemed surprised the most was Naruto's team.

"Ok, you got me. I quit." He said in an almost cheerful manner.

Hayate flipped a page on his clipboard and confirmed him. After he did, he allowed Kabuto to go. Before the guy could walk out though, Naruto began to protest to his reasons why. His actions also puzzled Team Katsuragi; even Rei was puzzled at this.

'_Why would he quit when he came so far into the exam?'_ She thought to herself as she watched the exchange between the teen in question and Naruto. _'He appears fit to continue on. So why is he backing down? It is not logical.'_

After a brief whisper between his teammates, Kabuto continued his stride to the door with everyone's eyes on him. Up front, Misato overheard a little bit of a background on Kabuto. When she heard Anko's explanation on his ninja record, she was surprised that someone like him was even in the exam for seven times in a row. After she heard about how he was found, she turned to look at him as he walked out.

'_Something about this guy doesn't add up,'_ she thought. _'From the way they described his record, he shouldn't even _be_ in the exams at all. Yet he seems like the type who's been in more fights than anyone can count.'_ She narrowed her eyes. _'Just who are you, Kabuto Yakuchi?'_

Everyone's thoughts were interrupted by another cough from Hayate. "Well, is there anyone else who wants to quit?"

Shinji noticed another exchange between Sasuke and Sakura about him quitting. He noted Sakura's look of fear and great concern for her teammate and he also noted her teammate's look of determination and frustration; even Naruto was showing his protest. But Shinji also noted he was still holding his neck at a certain point and it began to concern him too.

'_I wonder what happened to him.'_ Shinji thought to himself.

When no one else raised their hands to quit, Hayate continued. "Alright, we'll begin the preliminary matches now." He then put his arms behind his back and explained to them that the third exam was a one-on-one, anything goes, fight. He also said that there would be thirteen matches, considering that there were twenty-six of them left. The ones who would win their matches would advance. The winner would be decided if their opponent is dead, incapacitated, or gives up. If they continue to fight even after the winner is declared, then he would step in.

He then indicated a screen to the left of the sculpture near the right arm that revealed itself after a panel opened. He then explained that the names of the competitors will be chosen completely at random before each match. He then finished and then everyone's eyes turned to the screen as the names of each of the competitors flashed by quickly. Then the panel stopped and everyone looked at who was going to fight first.

_Sasuke Uchiha_

_Vs._

_Yorori Akado_

'_Sasuke Uchiha off the bat?'_ Misato thought incredulously as she stared at the two names.

"Alright, those whose names have been called, come forward." Hayate announced; the two did so. Neither objected to their being chosen for the first match. "Everyone else may watch from the upper level."

With that, every Genin, their Jounin instructors, the Hokage, the Chuunin and Jounin with him, all walked up to the upper level catwalk that overviewed the arena. The only ones left were Hayate, Yorori, and Sasuke. Most of the foreign ninja stood across on the catwalk opposite from the Leaf village teams; Team Katsuragi, on the other hand, took it upon themselves to stay with them; there seemed no protest from the Leaf teams.

'_Now, let's just see how good this "Sasuke" really is.'_ Asuka thought as she looked down at the two competitors.

"Alright, if you're both ready…" Hayate began as he stood in the middle as the two faced each other. "…Begin the match!" Almost immediately the two threw shuriken at each other, but when Sasuke did he immediately clutched the back of his neck and fell over in pain.

Shinji watched this and was the first to ask. "What's wrong with his neck?"

"Got me," Asuka said, shrugging her shoulders. "It looks as though he's hurt there."

Misato narrowed her eyes as she watched the match. _'Could this be what they were talking about? Is there a curse seal on his neck that's giving him pain?'_

Yorori then charged at Sasuke at incredible speed and was ready to punch Sasuke while he was down. But Sasuke rolled out of the way just as Yorori punched the floor and then he embedded his kunai into the floor to hold him down while he used his legs to pin Yorori down with him and this got a good reaction from Naruto. Then Yorori grabbed Sasuke's shirt and something strange began to happen; Rei was the only one who noticed.

"I see," She said, causing her team to look at her. "Akado-san has the ability to absorb chakra."

"Absorb chakra?" Asuka echoed. "Is that even possible?"

Rei simply said, "Keep watching and you shall see."

They watched indeed as Sasuke released his grip on Yorori's right arm, which was able to come down and jab at Sasuke's chest causing the boy to grunt in pain. Yorori then got up and back-flipped away from Sasuke, who was still on the ground shaking like a leaf as if all of his strength had been sucked away. Yorori then charged at him again; Sakura yelled out to Sasuke, who got up just in time to see Yorori grab his head with his right hand while blue chakra was pumping from it.

"M-my chakra, what are you doing!?" Sasuke managed to say with much strain in his voice. "You're stealing it from me!"

Yorori just laughed. "You're just noticing it now?"

Asuka blinked in surprise. "When you're right, you're right Wonder Girl."

Shinji was also watching this and looked at Rei. "What exactly is happening, Rei?"

"Akado-san is using his own chakra to absorb Uchiha-san's spiritual and physical strength." She explained. "The longer he is exposed to this, Uchiha-san will lose all hope of winning." They continued to watch only to be surprised that Sasuke was able to kick Yorori away from him.

Yorori got up and looked at Sasuke. "So, you've still got some fight left in you. That's pretty impressive…for a guinea pig." He then gathered his chakra in his palm ready to strike again. "Don't worry; I'll make it short and sweet." He then charged at Sasuke again.

When he thrust his palm out to grab Sasuke's head, Sasuke sidestepped it. Yorori didn't relent on his attempts and neither did Sasuke with his dodges. Yorori succeeded in brushing his palm past a lock of Sasuke's hair and Sasuke immediately felt the strength he had leave him and he stumbled in his steps like a drunken man. Yorori taunted Sasuke and flipped out of the way as Sasuke attempted a back-hook kick at his head. Sasuke panted as he tried to think of a way to win.

Back up in the catwalk, Shinji turned to Misato. "Misato-sensei, he doesn't seem to be winning."

"Well that's obvious, baka." Asuka said sarcastically, rolling her eyebrows. "It's obvious this guy ain't as good as he boasts."

"I wouldn't be too sure, Asuka." Misato said catching her three students' attention.

"What's so great about this kid anyhow?" Asuka asked her.

Misato sighed as she looked down at Sasuke. "Sasuke Uchiha…" She then looked at her students. "…Is one of the only survivors of his clan." That shocked Shinji and Asuka; Rei, of course, knew that.

"What do you mean sensei?" Shinji asked.

Misato looked down at the fight again. "The Uchiha Clan was once the most powerful clan in Konoha." She explained. "They were famous and infamous with their kekkei genkai doujutsu, the Sharingan."

"Sharingan?" Asuka echoed.

"It was a very unique doujutsu that only the Uchiha Clan was known for besides their fire ninjutsus." Misato answered before continuing. "It allowed them to copy their opponents' moves and jutsus that they would perform. It also allowed them to see through almost any genjutsu and heighten their sense of sight." She then closed her eyes. "But all of that ended a few years ago. Itachi Uchiha, the eldest son to the head of the clan, killed almost every member of the clan in one night." That brought gasps from Shinji and Asuka.

"His whole clan?" Asuka said.

"In one night?" Shinji asked.

Misato nodded. "No one knows why he did it. But one thing was for sure; by the end of that night there were only two survivors of the Uchiha Clan." She then looked down at Sasuke. "And Sasuke Uchiha is one of them."

Shinji suppressed a gulp. "And what about Itachi?"

"He's the other survivor," Misato answered. "After he slaughtered the clan, he fled Konoha and was an A-ranked criminal in all the bingo books. So far, no one has been able to get to him."

The team then looked down at Sasuke and Asuka finally decided to ask. "Then why isn't Sasuke using that so-called kekkei genkai?"

"I don't know Asuka; I'm not a mind reader." Misato shrugged but she added mentally, _'Perhaps that's what that "curse seal" business is all about.'_

Naruto was shouting words of encouragement to his teammate, who looked back towards Naruto. Sasuke then noticed that Rock Lee was standing next to him and got an idea from the fight he had with Rock Lee before the exam started. While he had his back turned, Yorori charged again towards Sasuke ready to try again. Everyone watched as Sasuke sidestepped each thrust of Yorori's palm. He then surprised everyone and went below Yorori's line of sight and kicked his chin causing him to go flying into the air.

"Woah!" Asuka exclaimed as she watched Yorori fly up.

Everyone watched as Sasuke leapt up and got in behind Yorori. "I'll admit that I borrowed that from someone else, but from here on out its all original." He was about to make his move, but stopped as he felt a surge of pain course through him from the curse seal.

'_What's he doing?'_ Shinji asked mentally. He then noticed something; from a spot near where the shoulder blade met his neck, Shinji could see, what looked like, flames coming out of it and covering the left side of Sasuke's face. He wasn't the only one who noticed; Naruto noticed it too.

Just as it looked like it was going to take over, it began to recede. Sasuke then smirked and began his attack. He started with a kick to Yorori's left side, but it was blocked. Yorori commented on how slow Sasuke was, but then just as Sasuke was about to launch another kick he feigned it and backhanded Yorori down towards the arena floor. He then punched Yorori's chest and finished the move with a downwards kick into Yorori's stomach that embedded him into the floor.

"Shishi rendan!"

When it was all over, Hayate went to check on Yorori. It was clear that he was knocked unconscious. He and everyone else then noticed that Sasuke had gotten up, but was barely standing.

"Winner: Sasuke Uchiha!" Hayate declared.

Sasuke was about to collapse, but Kakashi used his knee to prevent Sasuke from falling. Misato watched them with narrowed eyes; she knew something was wrong with the Uchiha boy, and it was obvious that Kakashi knew something about it. They then witnessed a brief exchange of words between Naruto and Sasuke before Kakashi got Sasuke up and left the arena while the medics carried Yorori out. Hayate then stepped forward again.

"Alright, let's move on to the second match." He declared then everyone's eyes turned towards the screen again.

Once again, the names of every competitor flashed by quickly on the screen. Many of the competitors were already anxious to get their fight started. Just then the screen stopped on two individuals again.

_Shino Aburame_

_Vs._

_Zaku Abumi_

Hayate then requested the two competitors to step forward. Team Katsuragi watched as they entered the arena and looked them both over. Shino Aburame wore a long gray trench coat that covered his mouth; his eyes were covered in a pair of sunglasses. Zaku Abumi was one of the three Sound ninjas; but his arms were in a cast.

'_This one should not take too long.'_ Rei thought as she looked at the two of them. _'I know all about the Aburame clan and at the moment he has the advantage twice-over.'_

Indeed Rei was right; the match between Shino and Zaku was brief. After Hayate started Shino offered Zaku a chance to forfeit, but the Sound ninja refused and had revealed that one of his arms was OK to use. It seemed like he had the upper hand, but Shino surprised almost everyone when bugs began to come out of his skin! It grossed Asuka out, of course, but after an explanation about the Aburame clan from Rei she was still grossed out at the thought of having a bug colony being in the human body. More bugs were behind Zaku and were feeding off of his chakra.

Again, Shino offered Zaku to forfeit and again he refused. Zaku then surprised everyone by readying his other arm was alright as well. But just as he made his attack, his arms exploded! It shocked everyone after Shino explained that a few of his bugs had made it into the wind holes of Zaku's forearms, blocking their use. Shino then finished the match with a punch to Zaku's face, knocking him out and Shino was declared the winner. After the medics grabbed Zaku and carried him out and Shino rejoined his team, Hayate got everyone's attention again as he announced for the next match-up to begin. This time, the screen stopped at a name that Team Katsuragi was familiar with.

_Asuka Sohryu_

_Vs._

_Taro Yamato_

"Alright! Time for me to get my groove on!" Asuka exclaimed as she cracked her knuckles.

"Good luck Asuka." Shinji said softly too his teammate.

She turned to him with a grin. "Thanks Shinji, I appreciate it." She then grabbed hold of the railings and flipped down towards the arena and landed with the grace of a dancer.

Misato slapped her forehead and muttered, "Show off."

The Hokage stared at Asuka, as did everyone else with just one thought going through their minds. _'Let's just see how strong these Heaven ninjas really are.'_

Asuka's opponent, Taro, looked like an average Genin from the Leaf Village. He wore a tan shirt with netting underneath it as well as black pants with bandages wrapped around near the ankles of his legs. His shuriken pouch was wrapped around his left leg and he wore his forehead protector around his head. The two of them faced each other; Asuka had the look of confidence while Taro had a look of determination.

"Alright, if you're both ready…"

"I was _born_ ready." Asuka said, cracking her neck.

"I'm ready." Taro simply said.

"Alright then," Hayate began as he lowered his hand between them. "Begin!"

**TBC...**

* * *

A/N: Sorry to end it here, but I'm still trying to think of how Asuka's fight should go. I know I skipped Shino and Zaku's fight, but I didn't feel that it was important. You notice that I didn't put Asuka up against Kabuto, Sakura, or Ino and I will tell you why. I feel that by adding this new team of Leaf Genin, I can help Team Katsuragi advance to the next round where they will be more useful for my story. 

Now if anyone has any good ideas for earth type jutsus for Taro and/or good fire jutsus for Asuka, now is the time to submit them to me before I begin the next chapter!


	9. Chapter 8

A/N: Alright folks, here's the big one! The first fight for Team Katsuragi and it's Asuka who's first! Will she win? Stay tuned and find out!

OH, before I begin I would like to make something crystal clear to ALL of you! I will NOT, repeat; will NOT incorporate anything regarding angels, AT fields, the Second Impact, or anything else in that matter into this story! This maybe a crossover, but that doesn't mean I'll include that stuff in this. I'm trying to make Tentougakure and its ninjas sound as canon to Naruto as Naruto himself is. In other words, no clones of Rei, no Evas, no angels, no more tailed beasts besides the canon ones…need I go on? So get that through your heads RIGHT NOW people!

As disappointing as that sounds, I will change a few things for Rei, Asuka, and Shinji to make this even better than Evangelion itself (even though that's impossible). I will give a couple of them Kekkei Genkai, but I won't say who or what. More will be explained in later chapters and that's all I'm going to say.

Disclaimer: See previous chapters.

* * *

_Chapter 8_

"Begin!"

The moment Hayate announced that, Asuka made her charge. She pulled out her kunai, as did Taro and the two collided with a loud "clang" and were now facing each other while trying to gain dominance with their blades. The two of them pushed away and skidded backwards on the floor of the arena. Asuka smirked while Taro gritted his teeth as the two stared each other down. Asuka then proceeded into throwing her kunai at the young man, who threw his in return; the two blades collided and bounced away from each other on the floor while Asuka charged again for a punch. Taro blocked her punch and tried to throw one of his own, but Asuka grabbed his fist and kicked Taro in the stomach, sending him flying back. Taro growled and went through a series of hand seals and ended with a ram seal.

"Doton: Iwa Tounyuu (1) no Jutsu!"

At that very instant, Taro slammed his foot down on the ground and after he did, the floor beneath his feet crumbled and the debris began flying towards Asuka. Now normally, an attack like this would use rocks the size of a person's whole body. But because of the fact that Taro was a Genin, he was only able to use rocks the size of a medium-sized ball. Asuka just smirked at this and performed her own set of hand seals and ended them in a snake hand seal.

"Katon: Boukaheki (2)!"

After she announced that she took a deep breath and then breathed out a wall of fire that actually deflected the rocks. When the fire dissipated, Asuka was gone! Puzzled, Taro looked around.

"W-where'd she go!?"

Up on the catwalk, all but Team Katsuragi looked stunned as they saw how fast Asuka was. Misato grinned with pride as she saw her student fight. She remembered when they first became a team; Asuka was very rambunctious and was always itching to get into a fight with other ninja to test her skills. She also knew how often Asuka trained and knew that Asuka's training made her go far in their missions.

"Wow, she's as fast as Sasuke!" Naruto said as he looked, wide-eyed, at the fight down below. Sakura merely nodded in agreement.

Kankurou of the Sand team looked at Gaara, who gripped his arms as they were folded. He could feel the killing intent emanating from him and nearly shook in his pants. He could tell that Gaara was enjoying the anticipation of fighting this girl. The two remaining Sound ninjas were equally impressed; but as far as they were concerned, the Heaven ninjas meant nothing.

It was at that precise moment, Kakashi appeared from a puff of smoke behind Naruto and Sakura. "Yo."

Sakura immediately asked about Sasuke and he told them that he was sleeping soundly in the infirmary. What he didn't tell them was that he was being guarded by an ANBU squad. He then looked down at the arena and noticed Taro looking around for Asuka.

"I see the third match has already started." Kakashi said as he observed.

"Yeah, that girl, Asuka's fighting that guy down there." Naruto said as he turned his gaze back to the fight.

Kakashi's visible eye turned towards Team Katsuragi. _'So, Misato, just how strong is your team?'_

Taro just kept looking for her and was getting fed up. "Where are you!?"

"Hey boyo!" Everyone turned to see Asuka hanging upside down on the sculpture with a confident grin on her face. "Looking for me?"

"H-how did you…!?!" Taro stuttered as he saw her up there.

"Get up here?" Asuka finished his question before shrugging. "Easy, while you guys were all distracted by my Fire wall, I took the time to find a good spot where I could get a good shot at ya!"

"What do you mean?!" Taro shouted in anger.

Asuka only grinned as she went through another series of hand seals; one that Naruto's team and a few other Jounin knew all too well.

"Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu!"

She then flipped off of the sculpture and brought her hand to her mouth and breathed out several small fireballs at Taro. Taro gritted his teeth and did a ram, then a snake hand seal.

"Doton: Deido Gaikaku! (3)"

After he said that clumps of dirt immediately covered Taro's body and the moment the fireballs connected, he was completely covered. Asuka, thinking she had won leapt down from her position and landed on her feet like a cat. She stood up and looked at her handy work, only to frown at the sight of the ball of dirt in front of her as it collapsed and Taro appeared without a burn on him.

"You're pretty good." Asuka commented with a smirk but then her smirk faded. "But I'm afraid it ends here, pal!" She then placed her hand in a single tiger hand seal. "Houka Bunshin no jutsu! (4)"

After she yelled that, she breathed out yet more fire from her mouth. But then the fire split itself to both of her sides and then began to take shape. Everyone in the arena watched as the two fire columns took the shape of her body and solidified into Asuka herself! They looked like Asuka in every detail; from her red hair right down to that confident smirk of hers.

_'Hmm...very interesting, Misato.'_ Kakashi thought as he lifted his headband slightly to take a look at the clones.

Misato, on the other hand sighed and placed a hand over her eyes shaking her head. _'Why did she have to use _that_ jutsu!? Ugh…what am I gonna do with her?'_

"Fire clones?" Naruto blinked. "I've never seen those before."

_'Interesting…using fire to make clones?'_ Neji Hyuuga thought as he activated his byakugan to take a look at these clones. _'She's actually turned fire into a very unique weapon.'_

Taro merely scoffed. "Tch, so you've made clones. Big deal! I bet they're like any other clones!" He then charged at one of the clones and readied his fist. "You just hit 'em and they disappear!" With that, he threw his punch at the clone he charged at. But he soon regretted that decision when he felt heat coming from his hand. He screamed in pain as he pulled his hand back and cradled it. The shock was evident on the faces of many of the spectators. These clones weren't just any clones, they were actual fire!

"Sound thinking," Asuka mocked. "But dead wrong, baka!" She exclaimed with a grin. "These clones aren't called 'fire clones' for nothing! I simply molded my chakra with these flames to make them shape into my own good-looking self." She flicked her hair to emphasize the point. "But unlike most clones if you hit these ones, you only get burned!"

Sakura realized this. "So that means that if these things touch _him,_ he'll _still_ get burned!"

Asuka looked at Sakura. "Right on the button, Pinkie!"

**"I WISH SHE'D STOP CALLING ME THAT!!! CHA!!!!"** Inner Sakura shouted in Sakura's mind; Sakura herself looked pissed at being called that.

Asuka then turned her attention back at Taro. "So unless you want to become fried pork," The moment she said food, Chouji groaned when they were gonna eat. "I suggest you give up now."

"You wish!" Taro exclaimed as he charged at her.

Asuka sighed with a shake of her head, her clones did the same. "Why do they always wanna do it the hard way?" With that she charged with her clones towards Taro, who entered a few hand seals and slammed his foot down for another one of his Iwa Tounyuu.

This time, the rocks sped towards her clones to distract them; which it did. Taro then faced Asuka again, who sent a flying kick in his direction. Taro grabbed her foot and spun her to the floor. But Asuka landed on her hands and knees and kicked Taro down just as the clones began to head towards him. Taro was about to get up, but Asuka slammed her foot down on his chest, knocking the wind out of him. Taro looked up and saw that her clones were ready to punch him.

"Now, do you want to give up now or do you wanna end up barbecued?" Again Chouji groaned at the mention of food only to get smacked upside the head by his teammate, Ino.

With a shaky voice, Taro responded. "O-okay, I give up!"

Asuka smirked. "Good boy."

She deactivated her clones, who just puffed out of existence. Hayate then walked to the center and raised his hand. "Winner, Asuka Sohryu!"

Misato cheered for Asuka as she heard that. Asuka then walked back up the catwalk to her team, who congratulated her for the win. Around them, the other teams were beginning to get wary of what the other two members of Team Katsuragi were capable of. Some of them were even wondering if they were that good as her. The team from Sound, especially.

"What do you think?" The girl, Kin, asked her teammate, Dosu.

"It was pretty impressive, but I don't want to rule them out as a threat just yet." Dosu replied as he stared at Team Katsuragi.

"Should we inform Orochimaru-sama about this?" Kin asked again.

"No," Dosu said, shaking his head. "We may not have to."

After Taro exited the arena with the paramedics to take a look at his burnt hand, Hayate stepped forward again. "Okay, we'll now start the forth match."

Once again, everyone's attention turned to the large screen on the wall near the sculpture. The names of all the competitors once again sped through the screen and many of the more impatient ones were hoping that their name was next. The screen then stopped on two names.

_Misumi Tsurugi _

_Vs _

_Kankurou_

Kankurou grinned. _'He he, finally it's my turn.'_

Misato took extra care to keep an eye on this fight. She remembered her mission and after what her team had told her the day they arrived in Konoha. According to Rei, Kankurou was a chakra puppet user. Now it was a good time to see if it was true.

Indeed, Rei was correct. As soon as the fight started, Kankurou removed the bundle on his back while Misumi did something that even Team Katsuragi hadn't expected; he dislocated his joints, molded his chakra, and wrapped himself around Kankurou's body in an effort to crush him. Rei however, was not surprised when she noticed that the person Misumi was trying to crush was Kankurou's chakra puppet. Kankurou then turned the tables on Misumi and used the puppet to crush Misumi's body, who gave up before Kankurou could shatter his bones. All of this happened in less than two minutes!

_'Okay,'_ Misato thought, _'that's one out of three of those Sand Genin.'_ Her eyes then drifted to the said team. _'Now we just have to find out the capabilities of the other two. If I'm correct in my assumption on that Gaara kid, then Konoha maybe in for some _big_ trouble later.'_

"Alright, we'll now begin the fifth match!" Hayate announced as the medics carried Misumi to the medical ward.

Everyone once again looked at the giant monitor and watched as more names whizzed by looking like a jumble of words. Asuka wasn't worried, considering she had just finished her fight. Shinji, on the other hand, was worried on who he might face later. His thoughts were shaken as the screen stopped on two names.

_Sakura Haruno _

_Vs. _

_Ino Yamanaka_

Asuka turned to see that the screen had stopped on the girl she aptly nicknamed 'Pinkie' and the blonde girl from before. She noted that the two of them were rather shocked at the results. When she saw that they looked hesitant to fight each other, she felt a sense of nostalgia.

Everyone watched as the two went down to the arena; the blonde girl then spoke. "I never thought I'd fight you." She said. "Or at least I didn't think it would happen this soon." She then added, with conviction. "But don't expect me to go easy on you."

Up in the catwalk, Ino's team was rather upset at this turn of event. They weren't expecting her to face Sakura. It was no secret that the two of them were, and still are (whether they'd like to admit it or not), best friends; so it was expected that the two of them would be reluctant to face each other.

"Of all people for Ino to face," Shikamaru grumbled slightly. "It _had_ to be Sakura. What a mess."

"I know," Chouji nearly moaned. "I hope Ino will be alright."

Asuka, being the closest to Ino's team, overheard them. _'From the sounds of it, those two go way back.'_

"Go Sakura!" A blatantly familiar voice yelled as Team Katsuragi turned to see Naruto cheering for his teammate.

Asuka shook her head at the sight. _'That kid is incorrigible.'_

After a few more seconds of staring at each other, Hayate signaled them to begin the match. The moment he did, the two girls charged at each other at the same time and began to throw a few kicks and punches at each other. After dodging a kick from Ino, Sakura jumped back and threw a set of kunai at Ino. One of the blades missed but Ino caught the second one and threw it back at the third causing the two to collide and fall to the floor.

"I knew it…" Chouji moaned as he watched the fight.

"Sakura's totally tearing Ino apart!" Naruto said with admiration.

Shikamaru scowled at the blonde. "Idiot."

"What was that!?" Naruto yelled as he turned to the brown-haired genin.

Shikamaru then sneered at him. "You wanna make something of it? Go ahead, 'cause you'll lose." He challenged Naruto.

"Why I oughtta…" Naruto started, ready to pound Shikamaru, but he stopped as he heard someone else talk.

That someone was Neji Hyuuga. "That's it? That's as good as kunoichi can get in hand-to-hand combat?"

Naruto then turned to face Neji. "WHAT!?!

Tenten, the third member of their team stopped them before a fight broke out. "It's not because they're girls you know, Neji." She then turned towards the two combatants. "It's just that those two are using kid gloves. It doesn't matter if you're a man or woman in battle."

Naruto looked a little puzzled at what she meant. Asuka, hearing the conversation, decided to clear it up for him. "What she means, Naruto…" She then turned towards him as she caught his attention. "Is that they're holding back."

"Holding back?" Naruto echoed, almost confused as to why they would.

Asuka then turned to watch the two girls fighting. "Right now those two are just throwing their weak attacks; they're not even fighting at full-strength." She then narrowed her eyes. "Although, I get the feeling that the kid-gloves are going to be coming off pretty soon."

The two girls took a short moment to catch their breath before charging at one another again. After throwing a few more failed punches and kicks, Ino managed to land a blow in Sakura's stomach causing the pink-haired kunoichi to falter a bit. Ino saw her chance to throw a punch at Sakura's cheek. But she then did something unexpected...a resounding 'smack' echoed throughout the arena as both the combatants and spectators watch Sakura's head snap back in shock. Ino hadn't landed a punch, she slapped Sakura!

There was a long pause as Ino stared at her hand, also stunned at what she had just done. The brief second she was going to land a punch to Sakura's head, she saw an image of Sakura when she was a kid; it reminded her of the days when they were younger and very close friends. She wasn't the only one thinking of the past, Sakura was too.

When they had first met, Sakura had always been picked on because of how big her forehead was. It had prevented her from ever getting any friends until Ino came along. Ino had defended Sakura from a few girls who were picking on her while she was sitting with her. Since then the two of them became close friends; but it didn't last long. Like Ino and many other girls, Sakura had admitted that she had fallen for the young Sasuke Uchiha and had become one of the many fan girls. That was where they became rivals for Sasuke's attention.

Back in the Forrest of Death, while Sakura was looking over her fallen teammates, she had been attacked by the three Sound ninjas and had to try to fight them off herself. Ino and her team came along and tried to fight them but even they were no match for them. In the end though, Sasuke was the one who scared the three Oto-nin off; but it showed Sakura that Ino still honored their friendship, despite their fallout to try and earn Sasuke's love.

At that moment, Sakura snapped out of her stupor and clenched her fist. "Listen Ino, I'm not going to fight you over Sasuke!"

"What did you say?!" Ino shouted angrily.

"I'm not the weak, needy girl I used to be!" Sakura yelled back. "You're not even on my radar and you're not Sasuke's type, Ino-pig!"

"Just watch it, do you have any idea who you're mouthing off to, Forehead-girl!" Ino shouted back with her own insult.

"Are those two going to argue or fight?" Asuka grumbled as she laid her head on her fist on the railing.

"Uh…isn't that out of line, Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto said, turning to his white-haired sensei.

"Hmm…maybe; but there's more to it than that." Kakashi replied, puzzling the young blonde. "Sakura isn't the type of person who would misuse her own abilities, like callously hurt others. But she also doesn't like how Ino takes pity on her and pulls her own punches."

Hearing this, Asuka turned to regard Kakashi before looking at the two kunoichi in question. _'Just like me and Hikari.'_

The person she was thinking of was her friend Hikari Horaki; another kunoichi from their graduating class. Hikari was a by-the-book type of kunoichi; always did what she was asked, always followed the rules, and always tried to correct others in their mistakes. The two of them had met in Tentougakure's ninja academy and had helped each other through their time there. When they were close to graduation, Hikari asked something to Asuka that she would never forget.

-------------

_"Asuka, can I ask you a favor?" Hikari said as she stood in front of Asuka, her back turned to her. _

_"Sure, Hikari, name it." Asuka said happily as she placed her hands on her hips. _

_Hikari didn't turn to face her. "If we ever enter the Chuunin Exams and we end up having to fight each other…" She then turned to look at Asuka, revealing her young features. "I don't want you holding back." _

_Her brown eyes showed determination, which was outlined with her look of pleading and desperation. Asuka even noted a hint of regret in her eyes. Hikari was not one who would make such a request without a reason. _

_"I want to know how good of a kunoichi I can be if I ever want to surpass the expectations of our village." Hikari continued looking down before looking at Asuka again. "Promise me, Asuka! I don't want you to hold back on me just because we're friends!" _

_It took Asuka a while to process this request but she reluctantly nodded and said, "I promise, Hikari."_

------------

_'These two, despite their little façade of their rivalry, are friends who don't want to hold back on each other. They may not want to admit it to anyone else or each other, but they still honor that friendship they had.'_ Asuka thought as she watched the two of them just stare at each other. _'They don't want to hold back on each other just because they're friends. So after this, they won't be holding back anymore.'_

At that moment, Sakura reached up to her hitai-ate, slipped it off of her head, and stared at Ino. This action didn't seem to startle Ino a bit, because she understood what Sakura was trying to say; as did Asuka, Misato, Rei, and many other spectators. The only person who didn't understand was, of course, Naruto.

"I don't get it, Kakashi-sensei, why are those two just getting so worked up about by just staring at each other?" The said Genin asked.

Kakashi looked to regard his student. _'He doesn't realize that he's the same way, when it comes to him and Sasuke.'_ He thought before looking back at the two kunoichi in the arena. "Well Naruto, rivalry is tricky business; not that I would know." Unconsciously, Kakashi turned to look at Maito Gai.

Misato turned to regard Kakashi herself. _'That's for sure, Kakashi.'_ She then turned to look at Asuka and Rei. _'Sometimes I even wonder why Asuka considers Rei and Shinji, her own teammates no less, as her rivals. But then again, I've only known one rival in my life, who also happens to be my best friend.'_

Back with the two kunoichi in the arena, Ino smirked as she also removed her hitai-ate from her waist and said, "I understand."

Almost at the same time, the two girls took their hitai-ate and tied them around their foreheads. The two stared at each other for a few more seconds with serious looks on their face. It sent an unconscious message to each other and the spectators; they won't be holding back anymore!

At that very moment, they charged again, this time with more ferocity than before as they both punched at each other only to have their own fists collide, sending the two skidding backwards. They then charged again, this time Sakura performed the seals needed to perform the Bunshin no jutsu; Ino then commented that it wasn't a graduation exam and was going to insult her further when Sakura sent chakra to her feet and increased her speed. After she did, her two bunshins cancelled out and she landed a punch to Ino's face sending her flying across the arena floor.

Sakura straightened up. "I'm not a weakling anymore! It's like that redhead up there," She regarded Asuka. "If you play with fire, you're gonna get burned!" She then looked at Ino with conviction. "Give me your best shot, Ino!"

"I don't know whether to take that as an insult or not." Asuka said after hearing Sakura's statement.

"She was merely stating a metaphor, Asuka-san." Rei said, turning to her.

"Who asked you, Wonder-girl?!" Asuka snapped.

Ino wiped some blood off of her lips before getting up. "Oh I'll give you my best, but you're not gonna like it!"

"That was awesome Sakura!" Naruto cheered with a grin.

"Using chakra powered attacks, impressive; for a rookie." Kakashi said as he stared at his kunoichi student and her rival. "I've never seen Sakura this good."

Naruto turned to his sensei with a worried look. "You're not saying that…she's better than me…are you?"

"Oh no, Naruto, you're the greatest." Kakashi said with a sarcastic tone causing the said genin to slump his head down glumly causing Misato, who was in earshot, to laugh. Kakashi then turned to the combatants again. "Using chakra to power her feet and use a well-timed jutsu? I don't think even Sasuke could've performed better. Then again, at the beginning of her training, Sakura was pretty good at chakra control; so this really isn't a surprise."

The two kunoichi charged again, this time they both blocked each other's punches with the opposite hand and were straining against each other. They then pushed away from each other and threw a single shuriken at the same time causing the two said weapons to collide. For a while, the two continued to trade blow after blow at one another in almost the same fashion. It was clear to everyone watching that this would be a no-holds-bar fight and the two of them were evenly matched.

After one final punch that landed on their cheeks, both kunoichi were sent flying and skidding across the floor of the arena. Some of the spectators were impressed that they were still fighting; some were even thinking that it could go on forever. Misato regarded this herself.

_'From the looks of it, these two seem evenly matched.'_ She thought. _'They're matching each other's attacks and defenses; if this keeps up, this fight could go on all day or at least until they're both exhausted. But it's clear that they're not holding back anymore.'_

Rei was thinking something of the same lines. _'Haruno-san and Yamanaka-san are no longer holding back their own skills; however, we have yet to see what they're both fully capable of.'_

Asuka, however, was getting impatient and she wasn't the only one. _'Man, can't these two hurry up?! I'm getting bored just watching them attack and defend against one another.'_

The two got up and tried to catch their breath again, but not before Ino snarled and yelled out, "This isn't how this was supposed to turn out! How can you be evenly matched with me!?"

"Huh, I guess you were right Ino, you're too worried about your good looks that they can't be surpassed. I've been too busy training to worry about that stuff." Sakura fought back with a smug look on her face.

Ino growled as she pulled out a kunai from her pouch. "You're gonna pay for that! I've had enough of you making fun of me!"

_'From the sounds of it, Sakura's toying with Ino.'_ Shinji thought as he observed. _'She's trying to get Ino so mad that she'll make a mistake and it'll be all over.'_

Then Ino did something unexpected, she took her kunai up to her ponytail…and sliced it off! The action stunned everyone watching as the two traded insults again before Ino tossed the lock of hair in front of her spreading every strand of her blonde hair about the floor of the arena. She then brought her hands together in a ram hand seal.

"I'm ending this right now!" Ino shouted. "Get ready to tell everyone that you lost to me, Forehead-girl!"

"Oh man, don't tell me she's going to use _that_!" Shikamaru exclaimed in shock.

The rest of Ino's team had the same look in their eyes that Shikamaru had. Almost everyone else on their side of the arena was just confused as to what Ino was going to do. Some of them weren't confused at all; they know of what Ino was capable of and what her clan was known for.

Everyone watched as Ino brought her hands out in front of her with her middle and index fingers almost crossing one another and her thumbs touching at the tips. Immediately, Sakura, Ino's team, and quite a few other people watching the spectacle knew what was going to happen; she was going to use a jutsu known as the Shintenjin or mind transfer technique, a jutsu exclusive to the Yamanaka clan.

Sakura however, didn't seem worried. "Oh c'mon, I know what you're going to do. The Shintenjin no jutsu, it allows the user to transfer their own spiritual energy into their opponent's body and take control over it for a few minutes." She began before having a smug look on her face. "But like all jutsus, this one has its flaws too. The spiritual energy can only go in a straight line and moves at a slow rate. Not only that, but it has a ten meter limit and if the user misses their intended target the spiritual energy can't return to their body for several minutes, making them unable to move like a lifeless doll and vulnerable to attack."

_'That jutsu is mainly used for espionage and not battle. To use it in combat would be a big mistake.'_ Asuma thought to himself as he remembered everything on what Ino was capable of.

_'It's powerful, but as long as Sakura can dodge it, it's not a big threat. Plus if she manages to avoid it, Ino will be vulnerable and Hayate will be forced to end the match there.'_ Kakashi thought as he too remembered the ups and downs to the jutsu Ino was about to perform.

Rei also observed this. _'Yamanaka-san is pulling a big gamble if she is going to use that jutsu. Perhaps this is the mistake Haruno-san was waiting for…' _She then narrowed her eyes. _'…Unless Yamanaka-san has found a way to keep Haruno-san from escaping.'_

"So what, Forehead-girl! I won't know unless I try!" Ino shouted back as she kept her arms where they were.

"You do realize that if you miss, it's all over." Sakura taunted as she got ready to move.

Ino didn't respond but then Sakura began to run and Ino kept her eyes trained on her. "Ninpou…"

_'No Ino!'_ Shikamaru shouted in his head.

"SHINTENJIN NO JUTSU!!!" Ino finished with a shout.

At that moment, the two stopped as Ino's arms fell limp at her sides. Then Ino slumped to the floor of the arena on her knees and her hands touching the strands from her ponytail. Sakura's head was down so no one could tell if the transfer worked. That was indeed the question on everyone's mind: had it worked? Their answer came when they heard a slight laugh coming from Sakura.

"How unfortunate…" She then raised her head revealing the smirk on her lips. "Ino."

To Sakura's team's relief and Ino's team's despair, Sakura had managed to avoid the attack. Sakura was then about to charge at Ino to finish the fight, but she didn't get far as she felt a snag to her legs. Looking down, she and everyone else saw several strands of Ino's hair wrapped around Sakura's ankles with a blue string of chakra! They then heard a laugh from Ino and everyone watched as she raised her head with a grin as they saw the chakra coming from her hands.

"Gotcha!" Ino exclaimed.

"No way!" Sakura exclaimed in shock as she and everyone else saw that Ino had not used the technique at all.

_'Very clever,'_ Misato thought as she watched the move. _'Ino knew that Sakura would be anticipating the attack, so she feigned it to give Sakura a false sense of security; then when she made it look like the transfer had failed, she used her chakra to turn the strands from her ponytail into a rope to hold Sakura in place so that she can use it for real when she caught her. Ino used Sakura's own smarts against her; that's gotta be a big blow to her ego.'_

As Ino explained the same thing to Sakura she held her foot on the primitive chakra string that held her in place while running through the necessary hand seals again. "Now that you're not going anywhere, I can really use this and make you say that you give up. Now there's no way I can miss."

"Get outta there Sakura-chan!" Naruto shouted as he watched Sakura struggle to free herself.

"Now…" Ino said as she readied her chakra. "Ninpou: Shintenjin no Jutsu!"

Another pause, again Ino's arms slumped to her sides and her head slumped to her chest. The chakra in the hair dissipated and Sakura's feet came together as she looked the same as she did when Ino faked the attack. They again heard a laugh coming from Sakura as she lifted her head.

"Now _that_ was very unfortunate." She said with an arrogant tone.

"She missed." Chouji said disbelievingly.

"No, wait…" Shikamaru said narrowing his eyes.

"Good one Sakura-chan!" Naruto yelled with his fox-like grin.

"Not quite." Sakura said as she looked at Ino's body.

For a few seconds, Sakura didn't move and Naruto was getting worried. "Umm…what's going on? Why are they both acting so weird?"

He tried to yell to Sakura to attack, but Kakashi stopped him. "The mind transfer worked."

Lee and Naruto looked at Kakashi with disbelief evident on their faces. "D-does that mean that Sakura-chan is…" Lee began but Kakashi cut him off.

"That's right," He nodded. "Sakura's spirit is now being controlled by Ino; her spirit is inside Sakura right now."

Naruto turned to the arena in shock while Asuka grinned as she regarded this. _'Oh well, I have to admit though, Sakura put up a good fight. Ino, however, was just cleverer than her.'_

Just then, Sakura's right arm began to move and everyone knew what that meant; Ino was going to make her give up. Once her hand was all the way up, Ino spoke through Sakura's voice.

"Now, I, Sakura Haruno wish to wit-…" She began, but she was cut off by a shout from Naruto.

"NO!" Everyone turned to look at the orange-clad boy.

Asuka simply snorted as she did. _'Doesn't this kid know when to shut up!?'_

"You worked so hard to get here, don't disgrace yourself now by losing to Ino!" He shouted as he put his palms to the sides of his mouth.

Just as Sakura/Ino was going to say something in retort, she then stopped and slowly began to reach for her head almost in pain. Everyone watching was confused as to what was happening, even Team Katsuragi. The said team turned to look at Naruto as they began to evaluate the situation.

_'I don't get it, how can this kid just yell something and manage to get someone to keep fighting?' _

_'It is not possible to resist the mind transfer technique; how can Naruto-san be able to help someone resist it by merely yelling?' _

_'I don't know what it is about this kid, but he definitely knows how to make someone keep going; just like he did with Shinji.' _

_'Could Sakura be resisting the technique through Naruto's words? Or is it something more?'_

Little did anyone realize, that inside Sakura was indeed a battle over dominance of her will; and Ino seemed to be losing that battle. Hayate queried if she was withdrawing from the match. Sakura responded with an almost animalistic yell that she wasn't and was now beginning to regain control over her body. After a while, of struggling Sakura's hands came together and an aura of chakra erupted from her body and went straight into Ino. She then slumped to the floor in the same fashion as Ino and they both began to pant.

_'She was able to regain control over herself after Naruto yelled those words of encouragement.'_ Misato thought to herself as she looked at both Naruto and the kunoichi. _'What is it about this kid that he's able to get someone to keep going even when the situation looks hopeless?'_

After a couple of seconds of talking, the two kunoichi slowly got back onto their feet. However, it seemed clear to everyone that the next move would decide the outcome of the match. No one saw the slight smiles on their faces as they looked at each other as they both tried to catch their breaths. Then, as if by some unseen signal, the two kunoichi charged at one another to deliver a final punch at the other. The fists connected and the two kunoichi were sent sprawling to the floor as both their hitai-ate headbands flew off their heads and they fell. They both tried to get up, but they were too weak and exhausted and merely collapsed at the same time. The match…was a draw.

"Since both are unable to continue, this match is over and neither move on to the next round."

Their teammates expressed unbelieving comments, while their instructors went down and picked the two of them off from the arena floor and back up to the catwalk. Team Katsuragi watched as all of this happened and was having their own thoughts on the fight. Each of them having their own observation of the whole fight and why it ended up this way.

_'It seemed like Ino was going to win, but thanks to her sheer will, Sakura was able to make a comeback and finish the fight. Makes me kinda wish I was up against the two of them instead of that baka I nearly fried.' _

_'The two were on equal grounds even in terms of will power; but they had both exhausted themselves to the point where this match would end up in the same result.' _

_'Now that two more of the applicants are out, that leaves only sixteen more combatants, including Shinji and Rei.' _

_'It was an amazing fight, even to the very end.'_

Their teams, plus Rock Lee gathered around the two of them, but it was clear that there was no need for the two of them to go to the infirmary for treatment. They only needed a little rest and they would wake up to watch the rest of the match-ups of the preliminaries. Asuka smiled as she saw the two sitting next to each other; she then closed her eyes to remember the promise she made to Hikari.

------------

_"I promise, Hikari."_ _She nodded as she looked at her friend with the same conviction. _

_"But also promise me…" Hikari said as she looked down. "That no matter what happens…we'll always be friends." _

_Her words made Asuka's eyes widen, but she grinned and nodded. "That, I will definitely promise."_

------------

"We'll now begin the next match." Hayate announced as he caught everyone's attention.

Once again, everyone was staring at the big screen as it came on and began flashing through the names of the combatants. Misato looked down at Shinji and Rei as everyone else watched the screen. She knew that eventually those two would have to fight; but she hoped they wouldn't have to face each other. Turning back to the screen, she saw that it had stopped yet again; and smiled.

_Masaya Saotome _

_Vs. _

_Rei Ayanami_

Asuka grinned as she turned to her blue-haired teammate. "You're up Wonder-girl!" She then scowled at her. "And you had better not lose, because you're only going to lose to _me_ got it!?"

Rei calmly turned and walked. "I do not intend to lose."

"Good luck Rei-chan!" Shinji called out stopping her long enough so she could regard him.

"Arigatou, Shinji-kun." She then continued her calm stride from the catwalk to the arena.

**TBC...**

* * *

A/N: Well, that's it for this chapter! I know I made Sakura's fight longer than Asuka's, but I wanted to be more detailed than just skip most of the fights. I did intentionally skip Kankurou's fight but the next fight will show off some of Rei's moves. Speaking of which, I'll discuss the new jutsus I introduced in this chapter. 

1.) Earth Release-Rock throw technique: This is a jutsu I came up with from scratch. The user basically sends some chakra to their foot to increase its strength and send it to a piece of rock in the ground before sending the said rock to their opponent.

2.) Fire Release-Firewall: Now this, I credit to **Kitsune no Rai**. Since they sent this idea to me, I decided to use it in this chapter. Its name suggests what it can do.

3.) Earth Release-Mud Shell technique: This is also credit to **Kitsune no Rai**, who came up with this jutsu for this.

4.) Fire Clone Technique: Now this I sort of borrowed from another author, who allowed me to use their stories for reference. I can't quite remember who it was, but it was one of their stories that actually featured this jutsu.

Now I apologize for not posting this chapter sooner, but writer's block reared its ugly head to me once again. But now, thanks in part to that "Naruto Hundo" on Cartoon Network; I was able to get some inspiration to finish this chapter. I know I should've put more action in Asuka's fight, but she'll get her chance in the spotlight.

Now in the next chapter, its Rei's turn to fight; but I need ideas as to what kind of jutsus her opponent should use or if they should have a kekkei genkai or not. If anyone has any ideas, let me know. Now in the words of Tigger, "TTFN, Tata for now!"


	10. Chapter 9

A/N: Ok, Here's Rei's battle; will she make it, or will she be the next one in the infirmary?

Disclaimer: See previous chapters.

* * *

_Chapter 9_

Rei stood in the center of the arena floor; in front of her, her opponent, Masaya Saotome, stood opposite of her as Hayate stood to the side. Unlike his teammate, Taro, Masaya showed that he had plenty of arrogance and wouldn't hesitate to show off; just like Asuka, Rei mentally noted. Masaya stood a good few centimeters taller than her but it was mostly because of how spiked his dark hair looked. Just by looking at him, Rei could tell that his specialty was close-combat; and he was also able to use some ninjutsu to deal it. She knew she had to end this and fast.

Up in the rafters, the spectators all readied to take notes as they watched Rei in the fight. Many of them still remember what happened in Taro and Asuka's fight; Taro had nearly been burned to a crisp thanks to Asuka's fire jutsus. Now they were curious as to what Rei was capable of and what her specialty was.

"Heh, me against a little girl…?" Masaya jeered while cracking his knuckles and flexing his muscles. "This oughtta be quick!"

Rei didn't seem to be intimidated at all. She calmly closed her eyes and said, "I would suggest you forfeit the match."

Masaya's smirk fell as she continued. "If you do not, I will not be responsible for what will happen."

Masaya scowled at her and growled like a bear. "Humph! Like I'm gonna give up to you? Well think again, doll!"

Rei's eyes snapped open but she kept her calm composure. While she didn't show it, she was insulted by the jab Masaya had called her. After all, it was one of Asuka's common insults to her.

Up in the rafters, the said person grinned and leaned on the guardrails. "I'd listen to her if I were him." She said causing a few of the other Genins present to look at her.

"What do you mean, Asuka-chan?" Naruto asked almost earning a glare from the said girl for calling her that.

"What I mean," Asuka said looking down at Rei. "Is that this guy is in way over his head." Her grin widened ever so slightly. "And he shouldn't have called her that."

"If you're both ready…" Hayate said looking at the two of them before bringing his hand down in between them. "Begin!"

After Hayate moved out of the way, Masaya began the match by throwing a downward punch towards Rei, who jumped away in the nick of time. When Masaya's fist made contact with the floor, the tiles underneath it exploded and when the dust cleared, there was nothing left but a small crater; the action stunned those watching. Masaya glared at Rei as she flipped backwards and landed on her feet and looked at her opponent calmly.

_'From the way they look, Masaya could easily overpower Rei in terms of strength.'_ Kakashi thought as he watched before turning his lone eye towards Misato, who was grinning as much as her red-headed student. _'But then again, we don't know what Rei is capable of. Just what is it that you are hiding, Misato?'_

"Hey Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto asked getting his sensei's attention. "Do you think Rei-chan has a chance of winning this?"

Kakashi raised an eyebrow at how Naruto referred to Rei but answered his question regardless. "Well Naruto, if this were a test of brute force then I would say that Masaya would come out on top." The answer seemed to disappoint Naruto, but Kakashi continued. "However, we have yet to see what kind of specialty Rei has in terms of ninjutsu." He turned towards the person in question. "I would be lying if I said that she wouldn't have any surprises for us. She might just pull something off to win."

The answer seemed to satisfy Naruto as he turned to look again. As he watched, he saw that Masaya was now charging at Rei with a battle cry with his fist raised, ready to strike. Rei, being against the wall, leapt forward just as the fist connected with the wall. The impact shook the rafters and startled those on them. Masaya pulled his fist back and turned to see Rei standing in the middle of the arena with her hands in a ram hand seal.

"Koori Bunshin no jutsu (1)."

The moment Rei said that, small crystals of ice began to form on the floor and expanded slowly. Masaya paused to watch, as did everyone else as the ice crystals continued to grow and form into Rei's form. There were a total of two of these forms with her in between them. After a few seconds, the ice solidified into her body before the ice itself then took on her body pigments. Then she and the clones opened their eyes at the same time and separated.

"What the heck!?" Masaya said startled as he saw this.

The spectators were also stunned that she was able to form such clones made up of ice. Some were confused as to how she was able to do it; ice was not easy to come by in their current environment. So how was it that she was able to make such clones without water or ice nearby?

"Ice clones?" Sakura blinked, she and Ino had woken up shortly after the next match was decided. "How can she be able to make clones like that? It's way too warm for something like that."

"It's one of Rei's specialties." Misato said, catching the spectators around hers' attention, minus her two students. "She's able to pour her chakra into the moisture in the air and freeze it. How she's able to do this, I don't know. But it's one of the two things Rei specializes in when it comes to elemental jutsus."

"But if she's able to create these clones, won't they shatter once they come into contact with an opponent?" Shikamaru asked; a little interested for once.

"Just watch, you'll see." Misato said with a grin.

"Tch, what good will these do ya!?" Masaya said as he punched the floor causing it to crack towards Rei's direction.

Rei and her clones jumped away from the cracks that formed and charged at Masaya. Masaya merely grinned and waited for her. When one of her clones got close, he swung a fist at it and shattered its left arm completely off causing it to hit the floor and look like a frozen ice statue of a person's arm. When the clones and Rei landed, the clone grew back its arm! Masaya and everyone eyes gawked at the sight and Masaya himself backed up a little.

"H-how…how did you do that!?" Masaya stuttered, almost afraid.

In the rafters, Asuka heard the others ask the same question and decided to answer for them. "Unlike water clones and rock clones, ice clones don't disperse after you hit them. If a good portion of the clone is still intact, then the piece that was destroyed merely grows back."

Those listening in were too stunned but it was Sakura who was able to raise a question. "But what about the piece that came off?"

Asuka merely shrugged and looked at Sakura with a grin. "It grows the rest of the body back."

As if to emphasize her point, the arm that had come off began to reform into a clone of Rei that was lying down on the floor. It stood up after it was completed; after it did, Masaya could only gawk but he then scowled and charged like a rampaging bull at the real Rei. One of her clones blocked his way, but he shattered it as he rammed his shoulder into the mid-section.

He turned to see if the clone was re-growing itself, but to his relief the clone's shards melted into the floor. With a grin, he turned to the real Rei, but she and her two other clones were gone. He turned frantically around for her and spotted her near the statue in the arena. He began to charge again, but Rei nodded towards her two remaining clones, who charged at him. Masaya grinned and repeated what he did to the first one and continued his charge at Rei. Rei once again moved out of the way as the larger genin rammed himself into a wall.

Frustrated, Masaya turned around and saw Rei crouching down to one of the puddles where some of the shards of her ice clones had melted. Closing her eyes, she went through a small group of hand seals and ended them in a snake seal. Opening her eyes she said three words.

"Hyo sho senbon. (2)"

After she said that, she opened her right palm and small ice crystals formed from the puddles and formed into her hand as four tiny needles. She gripped them and waited as she saw her opponent charge at her. She then took the senbon in her hand and threw them at him. Masaya grinned as he stopped and let the senbon hit his left leg. Up in the rafters, Asuka's grin widened even more.

"Ha! You think little senbon like those will stop…AGH!!!" He then doubled over and gripped where the senbon had hit his leg only to have his eyes widen as he saw that his leg had started to become blue and go pale.

He wasn't the only one to notice. "W-what's going on!?" Ino exclaimed as she too saw the change in Masaya's leg.

"Those were not ordinary senbon." Rei said as she stared at her now disabled opponent. "Unlike ordinary senbon, which are made from metal, these senbon are made from ice. However, since they have my chakra poured into them I am able to control the actions of the ice crystals within these senbon."

"W-what a-are y-you t-t-t-t-talking about!?" Masaya demanded with his teeth chattering.

"When these senbon come into contact with an enemy, I can use my chakra within them to spread ice crystals throughout my opponent's bloodstream and freezing it and the limb the blood stream leads to." Rei explained. "In other words, your leg is becoming frostbitten as we speak."

Shikamaru was beginning to understand. "I get it;" He said catching everyone's attention. "If she was able to throw those things at him from all directions, she could literally freeze him to death."

"That's the idea." Asuka said with a triumphant tone.

"However, I only poured enough of my chakra to freeze a portion of the tissue in your leg." Rei said calmly. "If untreated, the rest of the leg will become frostbitten within at least an hour."

Neji Hyuuga, after activating his byakugan, spoke up. "I can see it now, the ice crystals inside his leg are forming at a slow but rapid pace."

Masaya just continued to stare helplessly at his leg as it became lesser than its original skin tone as Rei continued. "So unless you do not wish to lose this leg to frostbite, then I would suggest that you forfeit now and have it treated. If you do not, then I cannot guarantee that you will merely lose a single limb to frostbite."

Masaya gulped. "O-okay, I quit!" He said with a shiver. "It's just so cold!"

Rei closed her eyes. "A wise decision."

Hayate coughed slightly before raising his right hand. "Winner by forfeit, Rei Ayanami."

After that announcement, Misato once again cheered as Rei calmly walked towards the catwalk, while medic ninjas took Masaya out on a stretcher. As she walked back to her teammates, the Sound Ninjas were silently watching her with scrutinizing eyes. Kin looked over to her bandaged teammate.

"That jutsu might become a nuisance." She said, referring to the jutsu that Rei used to win.

"I agree," Dosu said calmly as he too watched Rei. "But we have only seen a portion of what she is capable of. If she's capable of more, then Orochimaru-sama might find a use for her."

They weren't the only ones watching her; Gaara was also watching her with the bloodlust growing in his eyes. He could just feel her wanting to taste Rei's blood; if she was capable of such unique techniques, then she would be enough to prove his existence. Perhaps her blood may be cold enough to be a sweet punch.

Kakashi also watched as Rei walked back to her team. _'To be able to manipulate moisture in the air like that is impressive. It's almost as if she were from Kirigakure. But then again, we don't know what else she's capable of.'_

"That was awesome Rei-chan!" Naruto exclaimed as she walked past him.

She merely closed her eyes and said, "Arigatou, Naruto-san." And continued her stride back to her team.

Asuka looked at her and instead of a nice greeting she frowned at her. "You could've ended the match a lot sooner you know."

Rei returned to her spot next to Shinji and did not look at Asuka. "I would have…" She then turned to Asuka. "If I wanted to kill him."

"Humph, whatever." Asuka said waving the comment off.

Sarutobi looked at Team Katsuragi and puffed a small bit of smoke from his pipe. _'So far, the team from the Heaven village has won their matches by forcing their opponents to forfeit. But what about this, Shinji Ikari? What is he capable of doing?'_

A few minutes later, after the clean-up crews cleared the arena for the next match, everyone was once again fixated on the giant screen on the wall and watched as the names of the competitors flashed by again. Once again it stopped on two names.

_Tenten _

_Vs. _

_Temari_

This made Misato's eyes narrow. _'Now we move on to the second member of that Suna team.'_ She watched as the two kunoichi went down to the arena. She noted that the girl, Tenten, was the girl from Neji Hyuuga's team. _'Let's just hope that girl can hold her own down there.'_

Misato, Asuka, and Shinji then immediately covered their ears just as they heard Tenten's sensei, Maito Gai, and her teammate Rock Lee started cheering for her.

_'Sheesh! These two are even bigger idiots than Naruto and probably even louder too!'_ Asuka thought as she came very close to hitting both of them upside the head to shut them both up.

When Hayate signaled the fight to begin, everyone was immediately aware that Tenten was a weapons specialist. She took out a pair of scrolls and summoned weapons from them and threw them at Temari. Temari acted as though she was standing still but she surprised Tenten when she deflected her weapons with the wind from her fan at an incredible speed. Tenten tried again with a different approach; instead she threw her weapons from scrolls in the air and the weapons were attached to wires on her fingers. Like before, Temari used her fans to deflect them despite Tenten's best to attack her with them.

But then Temari used her fan almost like a glider to fly over Tenten before landing where she was. She then took her fan and swung it hard causing a miniature tornado to form around her. After she was caught in it, Tenten felt as though the winds were tearing her body apart considering that she was getting cuts all over her body. While they were small and non-lethal, it still did the job. As the wind dispersed, Tenten fell, only to land back-first into the tip of Temari's, now folded-up, fan! After she landed, a lot of the competitors just watched with stunned expressions as Tenten coughed up blood.

Shinji visibly winced at the sight. "Ouch…" He muttered almost as if he felt Tenten's pain.

"No kidding." Asuka said nodding in agreement.

Misato, on the other hand, narrowed her eyes at the sight. _'That was a little uncalled for. Tenten had clearly lost the fight, but Temari didn't have to be so rough on her afterwards! Still, at least we know a little bit of what she's capable of. Had she been born from our village, she probably would've mastered _that_ jutsu at a very young age.'_

Temari scoffed as she looked at Tenten. "That was really, really boring."

"Winner by knockout, Temari." Hayate announced as he stepped to the middle of where Tenten's weapons were scattered about.

Then, everyone watched as Temari swung her fan and threw Tenten across the arena right over her weapons; even Team Katsuragi were stunned by this! Had Lee not been there to catch her, Tenten could've easily landed on one of her own weapons and her injuries would have been worse or fatal. Lee looked at Temari as he set Tenten down.

"Nice catch." Temari said with a sinister grin.

"Why did you do that!?" Lee yelled. "That is something you should not do to someone who fought her best!"

Temari slammed the end of her fan down on the floor. "Shut up! Take that piece of trash and leave."

Asuka growled as she heard Temari. "That girl has a serious attitude problem!"

Misato looked at Asuka with a glare. _'That, Asuka, is a case of the pot calling the kettle black.'_

Lee growled and began to charge at Temari, despite the protests of his teammate Neji. He then leaped in the air and spun his leg around to kick her. But Temari blocked his foot with her fan.

"You're just like how you dress, so stupid." Temari said with a sneer.

Gai then came down and stopped Lee from continuing. Gaara also told Temari to get back up to where they were. Not wanting to feel Gaara's wrath she complied. Gai then looked up at the Sunagakure team after Gaara had said something that offended Lee.

"I might want to warn you Sand ninjas of something." He said with a confident grin. He then patted Lee's shoulder. "He's strong, so don't get so cocky."

Misato then heard something coming from one of the Leaf Genin nearby and she looked to see the team with Kiba Inuzuka, Shino Aburame, and Hinata Hyuuga look a little worried. She cocked an eyebrow at this. _'They know something about Gaara, but what?'_

She then witnessed as Naruto talked with his teammate. Her thoughts then turned towards the young blonde, bundle of energy. _'But I wonder…what is Naruto capable of? Is he as strong as he boasts? If so, is that part of the reason this village seems to hate him?'_

Their attention then turned to the screen once again as it flashed through the names of the Chuunin-hopefuls. Misato looked down at the only remaining genin of her squad. So far her team has won their matches, and through forced forfeit at that. Rei and Asuka were capable of intimidating their opponents; Shinji, on the other hand, was barely able to do that. However, they would think twice when they messed with Shinji when he was _really_ mad; and that would not be a pretty sight afterward. She then looked as the screen stopped at two more names.

_Shikamaru Nara _

_Vs. _

_Kin Tsuchi_

Much to the disappointment of Rock Lee and Naruto, the two Genin stepped down to the arena, which had been clear of all of Tenten's weapons. While the two of them stood in the middle of the arena, the place was now full of cheering from, the now awake, Ino Yamanaka; much to the annoyance of Asuka.

After the match started, Shikamaru had tried his clan's signature jutsu the Kagemane or shadow possession technique. But Kin, having been familiar with this technique, was ready for it. She had moved away from it, but she also threw a pair of senbon past him with bells attached to them. Shikamaru dodged them, but then shortly after Kin used her bells (while they were attached to strings no less) to distract him while she hit him with another pair of senbon. But she then did something no one expected.

The second time she rung the bells Shikamaru was down on his knees! Misato watched this carefully as Kin explained that when someone hears her bells they are exposed to a genjutsu that disables them temporarily. Shikamaru tried covering his ears, but Kin told him it was useless and that he couldn't. She then threw another set of senbon at him and hit him.

She was going to repeat the process, but stopped. Just then Shikamaru stood and almost immediately, Kin was following his movements! She had been so occupied in explaining how her little bell trick works, that she never noticed that he used the strings attached to the belled senbon as a path to her for his Kagemane. He then forced her to pull out some shuriken as he pulled some out of his pouch. She tried warning him that if he did that, he'd only get hit himself; but just after they threw their shuriken, Shikamaru bent backwards at the last minute. But when Kin did, her head came into contact with the wall behind her and she was knocked out.

_'Well what do you know…?'_ Asuka thought as she watched Kin hit her head. _'She didn't pay attention to her surroundings, but he did. He knew that if he ducked with her in his shadow possession, she'd hit her head on the wall. She was too concentrated on winning.'_

"Winner by knockout, Shikamaru Nara." Hayate announced.

After that was announced, Shikamaru returned to his team and everyone was once again fixated on the screen. The previous fights got most of their blood pumping and some more than others were very eager to start. Once again, Misato was going over who was left out of all of the Genins that have yet to fight.

_'Ok, so far quite a few of the Genins here have been eliminated.'_ She looked at the rafters across from her. _'The only ones who haven't fought yet are that Gaara kid, that remaining Sound Genin, that third Leaf genin,'_ Her eyes then drifted to the group she was with. _'That girl from the Hyuuga clan, her teammate with the dog, that boy from the Hyuuga clan, his spandex-wearing teammate, Naruto, that pungent kid,'_ Her eyes then turned to Shinji. _'And last, but not least, Shinji. Out of all the Genins here, I'm more worried about him and who he'll face.'_ She then turned her eyes to look at Gaara. _'If I'm right about Gaara, then I hope to Kami-sama that he doesn't face him.'_

Just as she finished her train of thought, she heard the screen stop and she looked up to look at it. She then grinned as she saw that it stopped on a very familiar name.

_Naruto Uzumaki _

_Vs. _

_Kiba Inuzuka_

_'Well how about that,'_ She thought. _'It's Naruto's turn.'_ She then turned to look at the said genin, only to try and hold back an amused smile at the boy's enthusiasm. _'Time to show us your stuff Naruto.'_

Misato wasn't the only one looking at him.

_'Well, let's hope this kid is as good as he boasts; otherwise, I will be _very_ disappointed.'_ Asuka thought as she looked at Naruto with her two teammates.

_'Time to see what Naruto-san is capable of.'_ Rei thought as she watched Naruto with careful eyes.

_'Do your best, Naruto.'_ Shinji cheered in his head as he stared at Naruto as he almost broke into a run to get to his spot in the arena.

**TBC…

* * *

**

A/N: Well, I'm gonna stop here. I know many of you were hoping for a longer fight with Rei, but it's the best I can do for her right now. Shinji's fight, on the other hand, will be a LOT longer. Now to name the two new jutsus I introduced in this chapter.

1.) Ice Clone technique: This is more of a combination of a solidified water clone jutsu and a rock clone jutsu but with my own quirks.

2.) Crystal Ice needles: This I came up with out of an after-thought. If people use poison in senbon needles, why not make ice out of them and make them even more deadly when in use by a ninja like Rei? So, I did.

But hang on to your hitai-ate folks! It's gonna get rough as we now get into two out of four of the most vicious fights in the preliminaries! See ya soon!


End file.
